The Running Woman
by Ms.Dawes
Summary: An alternately dark look at 'your undead to me' how it ended for Caroline, for the worse...
1. Chapter 1

**The Running Woman**

I don't own anything

Summary: Caroline is still running from Damon, she doesn't know it because he keeps making her forget, only she wont go down without a fight and the chase is on...(Dark Fic)

Rating: K+ maybe more later on...

chapter 1

A raspy voice threatened her almost sleep tonight…

'Caroline …'

She sat up with trepidation, anticipation and then after a creepy croak from a ghostly crow sitting on her window ledge… fear. she'd seen this crow before, she was sure, not that she generally went out of the way to notice birds of the creepy nature ala Hitchcock style. She also felt aware that she was strangely calm, the fear was still there. but it was ebbing away softly, melting with the moving shadows outside.

Caroline pulled her covers upto her neck and shut her eyes tightly willing the creepy hullucination to vanish, when she opened her eyes the damn bird was still flitting about near her window in her room restlessly.

she grabbed the pillow from behind her and threw it at the creature with revulsion, and that moment a dark image flashed in front of her, when she blinked her eyes the image was gone. The crow flew away making strangely familiar angry noises.

She felt the wierd fear resonate up her spine once more, gooseflesh broke out over her arms...it was like someone was calling her, watching her...something dark, angered....promising harm.

The Night scared her these days, a few weeks earlier night times were exciting for her as a high school senior, so full of every kind of wild opportunistic possibilities teenager's engaged in. Wild after school parties, boys & booze.

But then she'd stopped visiting all those avenues for fun, the parties, the school , college boys, even being intoxicated didn't hold the same juvenile kind of excitement for her it did a few weeks before...That's when Damon came into her life. All cheap thrills ceased to exist for her.

'Damon...' she shuddered at the memory of the fuzzy image in her bedroom. Caroline lay back down on her now pillowless bed, she didnt want to leave the safety of her covers to retrieve the pillow she'd thrown at the crow...however flimsy and pointless the protection her bed provided her.

When her heartbeat managed a steady rhythm she examined the last few weeks of her life feeling more and more vain and silly then any of those girls she used to make fun of or be mean to. Yep, she was one of those cheerleader types, who pretended to be above all, the cream of the crop. Unapproachable to others. All the hard work, the bubbleheadedness just for a man who would sweep her off her feet in the shadows of the dull night. Of every dull night she'd gotten used to in Mystic Falls. She hated being that girl now.

All that waiting for someone dangerously handsome and older to want her, to love her & be only hers. To be better then the boys who rejected her. So that she would have an amazing story to tell her gal pals about her own adventure with a older, sexy dangerous guy, to drive them all insane with jealousy, to spur them to find their own Damons. Which they would never, because there were only one of those around, and he was hers.

She sighed turning over. At least she thought he was hers, but after the first few times in bed she had this itch in her brain even while he was kissing and caressing her, his eyes were closed tighly like he was intensely wishing and waiting for someone else to appear in her place under him. It was how uninterested he was in her after their trysts and his snacks, how he never cuddled or comforted her, how sometimes he left right after without a 'i'll see you again' or a 'i missed you' and never in so many weeks in any amount of words or even brutal gestures a single 'i love you'.

She felt her neck gingerly, the bite wound from the founders day ball still hurt, It reminded her of his kisses and his gentle moments with her in a strangely twisted way. It also brought unshed tears to her eyes, because she remembered the night in fragments with him being sweet and gentle in the dark and then suddenly being vicious, crushing her in his grasp and biting her hard...telling her he was 'so' over her.

Cruel but true.

He mocked her senses. Made her feel helplessly alone and viciously sad, made her feel the bitter evil in his fangs, the mad frustration in his demonic eyes... all these she experienced before fainting from his biting her and then waking up on the cold wet grass...no surprise there 'alone'.

Didn't even have the decency to finish her off. And she had loved him so completely and selflessly.

***

The sexy car wash had been Caroline's idea of a fun money making school extra curricular activity, she'd let the nightlighting crow disappear from her mind like her delirious illusions about Damon and his the murky buckets of soap suds, She barked at the girls to do a better job, hustle more people, wash more cars and stood fiercely proud surveying her powers of controlling a mass of high school girls and multitasking by supplying fake enthusiasm and dancing idly to the feel of loud music vibrating through her body.

It was great. It was sunny, business was in boom, teachers were radiating waves to approval in her direction. Stefan and Elena were working slowly, more interested in making googly eyes at each other then the actual work, Caroline snapped her eyes away from their intensely childish flirting and tried smother the questions in her mind about 'him' , since she asked Stefan about his brother, him telling her Damon wouldn't be back shattered her insides so badly that she refused to believe it was true or to look or speak to either of Elena or Stefan regarding this matter. Although she knew deep down inside all this was not their fault, but it was very deep down, on the surface she believed both love sick idiots to be responsible for Damon's disappearance. She wouldn't be surprised if they'd thrown him in a cell and locked away the keys just because Elena saw her stupid bite marks.

Sometimes she really wanted to kick that girl, she was always in her way at the wrong place in the wrong time. she wanted Elena to dissapear right now no matter how much concern she'd shown for Caroline's welfare earlier..

Great! she was all twisted and dark now thinking about making her best friend disappear, and it was so all 'his' fault. He did this to her. Gave her a taste for spilling blood?

The newscaster Logan was standing by his van reporting the car wash looked disconcerting in his white collar suit and clean shave among all the wet soapy teenagers looking unruly in their cut offs and jeans. Just when one of the girls asked for a more towels she felt a peculiar thrill in the air, a change, a pull in the atmosphere, she looked around to see if anyone else had noticed the newscaster was will flashing his white teeth at the camera unconcerned. Elena and Stefan were now holding soapy hands and talking to each other. Nobody had noticed then.

Caroline blinked hard, there...the dark figure, Damon?

The breath got caught in her throat as she dropped everything at the fading image of Damon Salvatore calling out her name, his eyes sparkled unnaturally blue hypnotizing her limbs to move away with the figure, and she followed it mutely, smiling faintly. Finally, he had realised what she meant to him, finally he would tell her he was sorry and that he loved her back just as much.

Her first true love.

She didn't know It then but this first and only selfless love was the start of a nightmare for her that wasn't going to end for a really long, long time because love was the last thing Damon Salvatore had in mind for Caroline Forbes, insanity and murder was more his style.

Scary but True.


	2. Chapter 2

**The Running Woman**

**I don't own anything**

**Summary: Caroline is still running from Damon, she doesn't know it because he keeps making her forget, only she wont go down without a fight and the chase is on...(Dark Fic)**

**Rating: K+ maybe more later on...**

**chapter 2**

**You mystify but then you terrify me - shalini**

*******

**No one followed her out of the school's empty hallways to the woods, She walked hypnotised by an unseen force, It guided her firmly through sunny patches between large foreboding trees to an unknown destination, she knew she shouldn't follow the hullucination of Damon, it could only bring her pain and harm, her insides were screaming danger of the extra creepy sensation kind. But she couldn't stop her self from moving in the same direction, not even if there was a large neon red sign saying STOP! Danger ahead!. **

**Her comfy flipflops had come off and she was walking barefoot through the wild, where who knew what kind of flesh eating insects roamed, thorns, bushes rough stones and pebbles all cut into her feet and made them slippery with coagulated blood while she wandered further into her fate.**

**There were so many turns and windings, would she even remember all of them? How would she get back, wouldn't anyone worry about her dissaperance from a school event? Her mother was the these were questions she knew should have bothered her enough to stop her from continuing to get farther away from civilization, but somehow it didnt. The thought of finding Damon at the end of a rainbow like some pot of gold or whatever it was that had her hypnotised and dead determined to to find him. She couldn't get cold feet now, even though she doubted the force which brough her here would let her leave so easily. It had Damon's presistant feel to it.**

**It was too late to turn back now, no point in worrying, whatever happened here on wards was her perogative and his game for her. And she would not fail this time.**

**Winding paths led her to an old house in the woods, to the casual observer it might seem really odd but in her state of mind it felt right that Damon should be here. The painful vibration through her spine confirmed that he really was here. The Basement beckoned her even though she wanted to stop and sit down by the fire place, unseen strong amrs pulled her to continue, she stumbled a bit but followed obediently trying to talk down the rising hitch of fear inside her.**

**The stairway leading down was all deep demented darkness, the stuff real breathing nightmares were made of, she shut her eyes tightly hoping she didnt miss a step and fall on her face now, but amazingly she didnt need her eyes, Damon was guiding her. It could always have been her cheerleading senses too...Carolines mouth quirked into a smile at the silly thought.**

**The last smile before all hell broke lose.**

*******

**"CAROLINE!"**

**She was running now, her screams making odd random movie effects echoing off the basement walls mixing with the snarls of the red eyed, angry beast chasing her. **

**"CAROLINE!"**

**His voice was completely inhuman then, it had scared her the most, bouncing off the walls crashing harshly into her ears, hurting them, quickening her pulse, electrocuting her legs into co-operating with her. **

**She had to get out of here.**

**Caroline lost her balance on the stairs and slammed into the stairs knees and face first, her cheek stung, her knees screamed in pain but panic had kick started the adrenaline flow in her system the pain didnt still her into submission, she felt 'him' lunge at her on the stairs in his weakened state and not miss her...Blackness and cool breath from the basement engulfed her when Damon viciously dragged her by her feet back down the stairs, the terrified screams died down in her throat because the back of her head was being assaulted by the hard stone steps.**

**He was strong even in weakness, the gauntness, pale color & sunken eyes had fooled her into beleiving he wasnt well and needed her help. When she'd let him out hurriedly some man she didnt know had jumped at her and tried to stop her from opening the lock.**

**What a stupid mistake she had made. It was quick and painful to watch.**

**Damon had killed the man, snapped his neck in under 2 seconds. Her head kept replaying the sickening crack of his neck in her mind while Damon pulled her further into darkness, His voice was thick and husky with intense hunger, if he bit her today she wouldn't survive it, she knew. And she didnt want to die, not now, not like this. So she blinked hard to clear the forming tears in her eyes and made a desperate attempt with her free arms and legs to stop him. **

**She scratched, screamed & kicked with her free leg until he tumbled back with a surprised yell and she started on all fours back up the stairs. This time her cheerleading senses of speed, time and endurance had kicked 'd forgotten the pain in her knees, the blood trickling from her busted cheek and had made a marathon sprint out of the house, the sun wasn't shining anymore so she was out of luck, it wouldn't stop him from coming after her.**

**Again there was an inhuman growl with her name, from behind her and her heart sank, she had to run for it. **

**Heart thudding violently in her ears, she'd jumped into the woods trying to find someplace to hide, but even with the wild bushes, giant hovering branches of old bening trees it all seemed too open, too revealed, Damon would easily find her and he was quicker then her. There were more thorns, more sharp rocks nipping at her feet, this time some bushes even scratched her bare legs. Her hair had gotten loose and kept getting in her eyes.**

**It reminded her of Snow White's lonely excursion in the scary part of the woods.**

**It was a bloody mess, she was bloody mess and there was just nowhere to hide. Why did she beleive he ever wanted to love her? why? Why did she never develop a sense of appreciation for the normal and figured out the difference in right and terribly dark and downright twisted? why? why? why?**

**Suddenly she felt sorry for ever wishing for Elena to dissapear. She felt like crying out for Stefan, he would help her wouldn't he? But she had come alone, shunned them, blamed them for Damon dumping her and now she didnt have a hope in hell of surviving this. **

**Surviving 'him'.**

*******

**Panic had long before entered and set into Carolines mind, but it was starting to reach its breaking point now when she found herself utterly lost in the woods, it was all the pinheaded running blindly into the wild that had her lost, she was just scared. She needed to focus and calm down, she'd grown up here after all...how lost could she be. The woods lurched with creaks, thuds, bumps and croaks, every twitch of a branch worried her, every crunch on the ground behind startled her. **

**She felt afraid to call out softly and ask it was him for fear he'd figure out where she is with his vampire sense of hearing.**

**Darkness had set over Mystic Falls, the moon was a faint glow away from appearing, soon it would be pitch black and 'He' would find her. Night was his best friend & Caroline didnt think she was a night person. she thought herself made of sunny blue skies and cute chirping birds. Just as she thought she was about to collapse spent on nerves in the middle of the dark nowhere, she saw a flicker of light from a direction, and tried to still her heartbeat long enough to hear giggles and whispers.**

**A camp site! **

**Her heart leapt into her throat, this time with sheer excitement of being saved, Damon wouldn't dare revel himself to a group of strangers? He'd always made it a point to be secretive about his identity as the undead. But still, he wasn't the mass murder type, was he?**

**She pictured him again numb with anger over being made to chase his food, the level of malevolence reflected in his eyes had been a bit too high to really care about anything or anyone, although he had recognized her fully, he didnt seem to be big on self control. There was a desperation to feed and drain in his expression. The crazy light in his eyes reminded her of mad dogs, cows or bulls or whatever rabid caged animal that had been kept hungry for far too long and that dimmed her hopes.**

**They were the outcasts of the small town sitting together, huddled in light and shadows of a small fire and it looked like all of them were stoned. The druggies. Vicki Donovan was sitting in a corner chugging down alcohol and giggling free spritedly, probably under the influence of some kind of drugs, Caroline searched the crowd Elena's brother, who was fond of hanging arounf Vicki, there was no sign of him, other then Vicki she didn't recognise anyone.**

**She didnt even know Vicki that well, she knew Matt, her brother and liked him, He on the football team, popular, handsome, and sweet not troubled and wierd like his sister. She found it hard to believe they were really brother and sister, they were so opposite. The creeps and bumps of the woods had become less noticeable, and things were quite with the group in around the fire, most of them were passed out against each other, She felt a tickle of panic again realising she needed them all mobile and aware of themselves enough to be able to run for it like there was no tomorrow in case Damon found them.**

**Sighing, she muttered sadly "I really should worry about saving my own skin..." She came in full view and sought after Vicki, nobody moved or noticed her, they were too intoxicated or drugged...It made her mad, if she ever got out of this alive, she was going to try and find a way to help these poor unfortunate morons.**

**Key word being 'if'.**

**Vicki turned around after another swig of something nasty and grinned at her "Hey!! Caroline,girl, join the party!" She burst into giggles studying Caroline's ruined state with glassy, bloodshot eyes, "Never thought i'd see miss perfect cheerleader needing a hit, what happened to the pom poms and the big parties??" **

**"Vicky..." She started but Vicki continued to mock her "You like you had a cat fight...Meooww" She obviously found Caroline's state worth a good laugh, because she'd dropped to her knees hiccupping loudly with laughter at her expense.**

**Caroline sighed and got down to her bruised knees trying to find Vicki through her tangle of brown hair, she gave up and tried shaking Vicki to get her attention "Vicki!! Listen to me! there's danger here, we all have to go!...Now!" Expecting a sensible response from Vicki in her present state was well... pointless because Vicki only laughed harder, which is probably why she didnt hear the crunch of footsteps nearby...**

**A raspy voice rang out in her ears "Oh Yes, there's big danger, and he's found you kids" **

**Caroline turned and let out a scream with fear she didnt know she possessed, seeing Damon with his fangs drawn and bloody smiling at them gamely.**

**A/N: Thanks for the reviews guys, means allot to me...xxx**


	3. Chapter 3

There were accusing glares all fixed upon her in the clearing which was deathly now silent...no more drunken or drug high giggles rang out from the group of druggies she'd stumbled over, because all of them were ...dead.

In the haze of fright and the time it took her heart to recover from the shock of seeing Damon with blood on him, reminded her of the night they met and how confusedly she only remembered some of it and imagined there was something perversely dark hidden in the memories preventing her from remembering the real thing, he had devoured, literally all the druggies. Drained them dry as a raisin and left them staring at Caroline with disdain only the unfairly dead could muster. She turned to scream at the carnage but found herself two inches away from the overpowering smell of copper and glistening teeth covered in it.

Damon's blue/red eyes bored into her like a snake imploring its victim, Vicki Donovan had started to whimper in her drugged stupor behind her, Caroline and Vicki were the only ones left standing. "Carolinnne..." he sing song-ed, smiling a deranged smile, She gulped breaths of air to calm herself down but it wasn't working anymore, the panic had well arrived and was here to stay till she dropped from anxiety or blood loss or both at once. She settled for edging away from him for now.

"Damon ...stop... please..." she pleaded still inching away , why she expected that to work she wasn't sure, if founders day ball was anything to go by she should grab Vicki by the arm and run like running in terror was her one only plus point. It's not like he was slow or anything.

But human blood had strengthened Damon somewhat back to his sarcastic best , his eyebrows rose with scorn, if it hadn't been the forest with all the dead staring at her like it was her fault she would have found his expression comical. But it was not a funny situation and she felt like anything but laughing. "It's okay sweetheart....i guess i scared you with the whole caged animal's day out routine" There was the sordid laugh, he was candid again, like people weren't really dead because of him or like he wasn't really indirectly holding Caroline hostage. She thought of all of Vicki's friends he'd drained they were all intoxicated and high, it made her wonder whether all that affected his mind ? made it worse? What did it mean for her? The uncomfortable feeling at the pit of her stomach rolled into something painful at the thought.

"But i'm fine now, glad i didn't drain you on sight" He pursed his lips feigning sadness "would have really made me feel bad.." after a beat he added "Okay so not really but i would have missed you" Maybe it was the tension in the air or the way he stared at her, as if on que, her bite mark from their last encounter itched fiercely the urge to reach up and rub it was overwhelming, but she didn't dare move a muscle for fear he'd pounce and tear her into two.

If it was an intensely self centred monologue he was intent on delivering in front of her, she wasn't about to try and intervene or tell him to stop, her eyes darted about trying to find an escape route, the sky had dimmed further, and night had settled into the woods like a nightmare and threatened to swallow all of them, only the small fire made them visible to each other. And for that she was truly grateful.

Damon wiped the blood of face looking something short of sheepish and sat down with a deliberately long sigh in front of the fire, it was between him and them.

Just as Caroline was about to plead to his sense of self preservation and threaten him with police intervention and further imprisonment, he spoke again, this time his voice was softer, almost melancholic "You know i should be proud of him, he's probably got the sneaky streak from me, I mean i should have known it would take some look alike of Katherine to bring out the killer in him..." He shook his head lightly smiling to himself.

She knew he was talking about the being locked in the basement but the rest was as usual a mystery. He looked up at her bewildered expression and sighed again brightening up "I'm glad you didn't go for Stefan"

"I didn't, i went for you" There was sad moment of reflection, wishing she had chosen differently, looked for love and acceptance elsewhere. Too late and too bad, her mind told her to not think emotionally and find some kind of leverage to hold over him and run, but she couldn't think of anything that would even remotely be of any worry to him.

"You rescued me...I'm grateful Caroline, i knew if i could depend on anyone it would be you" There was such sincerity in his back to normal blue eyes compared to normal blankness at anything she did for him, that she felt choked up at the appreciation, in that moment her sore cheeks and knees crusted with blood were all but forgotten to her, she shamelessly wanted to run and put her arms around him and tell him she was glad he was alive and hadn't left her, no matter how selfish and mean it all sounded to her trembling insides. With a flurry of gooseflesh that broke out over her skin she realized she was freezing. And involuntarily felt a mixture of confusion and anger at him for using her, mocking her and biting her...how many times has he bitten her?

"Great way of showing your appreciation...chasing me into the woods and trying to kill me just makes my day" her attempt at sarcasm might seem out of place and out of line but this time she felt it was justified, he had dumped her after all hadn't he, then dragged her to his basement to help him, how dare he say he was grateful! How dare he look at her with so lovingly!

Those damn eyebrows rose again in new appreciation of her defiance and his lips quirked into the cool unbothered smile she was used to seeing, like she was a silly little girl who had lost her marbles.

"Well then, lucky for you these losers were here to take your place right?...oh sorry Vicki, no offense" he was on his feet again, the fire was flickering less now, it was about to go out any second...she couldn't really tell what colour his eyes were anymore, there was a faint glint from where she was standing with Vicki still cowering behind her, she needed to leave right now!

"So i guess you're pretty much over me now huh?" He was moving now, closer to them past the fire, past the dead eyes and Caroline found it hard to tear her gaze away and just flee "of course i am" she whispered attempting her adamant voice, it was hard when the surroundings didn't exactly cheer in her favour. "Let us go Damon, leave us alone, you've already done enough damage...go away and we won't tell anyone what happened here tonight"

She started backing up and almost fell over Vicki who was crouched behind her, "my mom's the sheriff you remember right?...one look at my bite marks and you're in really deep trouble Damon" she hurried on adding for greater effect when he continued to walk over to them confidently "And there's no way you'll get what you came after here ...especially that locket you stole from the founders day ball, you'll never find it ..."

That shifted his expression to completely serious and he stopped walking altogether, there was a chill in his voice when he asked "Where is it Caroline?...what have you done with it?"

Her mind seemed to have developed a life of its own and even though none of the rest of her was active, her mind was travelling to all known destinations and sources for ideas and help and it could really not be helped if she managed to say something completely stupid and irresponsible like "I gave it to someone to protect it because i wasn't sure you were coming back, i can tell you where it is if you let us go..."

Damon's eyes widened and his face contorted angrily at her, but before his fangs spilled out the silence broke with the loud noise a big black bird croaking and fly over them in circles. It descended slowly with something glittering in its beak. Something Damon seemed to see much more clearly and made him overjoyed because he smiled a fanged smile at her, the bird landed on his shoulder and dropped whatever it was carrying into his open palm.

When he held up the amber locket twirling and twinkling with mischief in her face smiling, her heart sank lower and harder than it had in the last couple of hours. He twirled it around his fingers like a contented cat, lost in the sensation.

But she guessed not lost enough because before she could make a move he murmured barely above a whisper "Hmm ...too bad for you Caroline...too bad" his smile winked out at her with the last flicker of the small fire dying out. And then everything went black.

Somehow Running into the pitch black wasn't as daunting as Caroline thought it would be, maybe it was the adrenaline still coursing through her system, because although the rest of her was stone cold she was still crashing her way through the bushes, dragging Vicki along like a rag doll with strength she honestly didn't think she had, once she barely missed hitting a tree...

She had to yell at Vicki a couple of times to get a move on when she collapsed at one point behind her, why she bothered trying to save someone other than herself was beyond her right now, maybe it was the need to prove to herself she was not going to partake in a mass murder he had committed, maybe it was the how he had said she was responsible for all these losers dying because she had run off after freeing him, maybe it was because of her morality speech that had involuntarily rolled out of her laden with acquisitions at his treatment of her, his being cruel to her and his obviously being psychotic and bad tempered like a unruly child because she hadn't helped him with his agenda, whatever that might be.

She wasn't sure why she did it, why she stood in the dark and yelled all these things at him, might have called him a couple of names too and affirmed to him blonde cheerleaders weren't poster girls for being complete airheads or material witnesses to be abused when it fancied him. It felt necessary, important to let him know of these thoughts that had been swirling in her mind for some time now, didn't help that imprisonment and hunger seemed to have made him more insane and lesser under his human guise than usual. The monster in him seemed to have magnified and become him.

Maybe it was because deep down she had a sure feeling she had made the worst mistake of her life and it was going to kill her tonight ...alone, unless she counted Vicki, maybe that's why she felt she had to say her piece however ridiculously loud and out of place it might have seemed. But then adding at the end how she wished she had gone after Stefan again instead of falling for an outright crazy was probably something she should have kept to herself.

About then she realized Vicki was no longer in her grasp, she looked around trying to discern the darkness but nothing made sense, her mind felt fogged up, her senses were out of whack, she couldn't make out what direction she had come from, couldn't see her hands..she gulped a painful gulp of air then...

The crow croaked loudly somewhere above her, "Vicki! Where are you!? Can you hear me?!"

It might of had been her imagination but her voice echoed all around her, confusing her ears and eyes. "CAROLINE!!!!!!" It sounded like Vicki somewhere behind her, in pain, she called out to her again.

"Caroline!!! I'm here! Help me!!!" Maybe she'd gotten her foot stuck somewhere. She sighed, her heart thundering loudly and followed the echoes of Vicki's strangled cries. For some reason everything after that went really, really blank then, and Caroline woke up at dawn clutching Vicki's pale lifeless form covered in her blood.

And then it was her screaming.

**A/N:hey all, thnx for the amazing reviews, you made my day!**


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: still don't own anything

...................

At first she didn't understand where or how all the commotion had gotten to her, she remembered screaming like waking up from a nightmare but then seeing the telltale signs of no life from Vicki's eyes she realized she was very wide awake and everything around her was very real. The way vultures descend on dead carcasses , there were hoards of sirens and voices that descended on her in what seemed like a couple of moments, Elena's brother seemed to be nearby suddenly, she recognised his whiney voice crying somewhere nearby clutching Vicki's foot.

The whole time everyone was trying to pry her away from Vicki's she never realized how very strong her own grip had become, why she couldn't have shown the same determination last night in the thick of all the mindless violence baffled her now numb senses. Her mother and other people talking to her, coaxing her to let go, surprises of shock and horror and paramedics barking orders were all melted into one, she didn't know how they managed to move her to her mother's cruiser, just the faint last memory of Vicki yelling for help coincided with the fresh memory of the police prying her bloody dried fingers off of Vicki's. It was like a large band aid being ripped off, it hurt terribly. Her nails felt broken and disfigured afterwards.

She stared down at them while her mother tried to talk to her as the sheriff of Mystic Falls full of dry anguishing questions and saw that her nails were fine, blood had dried over them like some hot crimson nail polish and given them an unnatural sheen. She felt like heaving right there and then but as on principle Caroline Forbes did not barf in police cars or in front of other people. Not even her mother. It surprised her that in this hour of craziness she still felt the need to embellish her own unspoken rules of sophistication for herself.

Instead she tried looking out the window and not her Mother's worried face which had so many questions she was sure she'd passed out if she tried to answer even one. She wanted to roll down the window and gulp down fresh air but there was a ringing in her ears of an angry bird squawking somewhere, she didn't want the subject of her nightmares materializing between her and her mother in the car so she resisted the urge and closed her eyes trying to ignore the total blankness of her mind.

"Caroline please tell me what happened? What have you done? ...just talk to me now, i can help you"

She didn't open her eyes or answer the sheriff of Mystic Falls.

...................................

The bathtub went red almost immediately as she slipped into it, its red pooled over slightly at the edges as Caroline got her bearings together and sat down in her tub giving rise to the various sores, cuts and scrapes over her body, the scent of vanilla bath oil was strangely at odds with its colour now. Miraculously ...they had let her come home. After hours of questioning, poking and prodding from her mother to 'tell the truth'. All their voices were the same kind of monotone to her, she couldn't answer any of them the way they wanted her to.

"_What do you remember last?" _

"_Nothing"_

"_Why were in you in the forest last night"_

"_Don't remember"_

"_How did all those kids die Caroline?"_

"_Can't remember"_

"_Did you have something to do with Vicki's Death?"_

"_I don't know"_

"_What about those big bite marks on your neck, going to tell us you don't know where they came from either?"_

_She only responded to that question with a haunted look, and they all left it at that for some reason._

Caroline took a brush and started scrubbing her nails, the crusted blood immediately started to dissolve, making the water darker. They had insisted on her going to the hospital and having her cuts and bruises treated but she had declined intensely. Maybe it made her look suspicious, maybe she was the sheriff's department number one suspect right now, the haunted look in her mother's eyes as she struggled to get some kind of answer out of her confirmed it.

But she still couldn't say what had happened, her memories had been tampered with that much she was sure of, maybe if she had started talking from the beginning of how she had sat at the Diner with terrible coffee and muttered about her fate with silly boys and wanting to be special like Elena Gilbert and that life was a competition to her, In all her shallowness how fate had given her an acid taste of what she had wanted with Damon Salvatore, how she had become his lover and blood donor for a few cheap thrills she might have remembered then what had happened to Vicki Donovan and the rest of her friends.

But she couldn't find it in herself to talk to strangers about her predicament no matter how well they meant. Her mother was the foremost stranger in her life always busy, never at home. So different from Caroline in every way...her mother should have been a man, she couldn't remember the last time she's ever seen her mother on a date or dressed in anything remotely other than her uniform.

She embarrassed her in allot of ways socially and from the looks of it now Caroline herself was probably a very large disappointment to her mother, surprising how she's never given her mother's feelings much of a thought before today. She threw the brush to a side, it collided with the mirror, taking it down in a glory of millions of small sharp shards on the floor and then she submerged herself under the bloody water to stop the phantom memories and sounds from resurfacing.

And it was peaceful ....just for a while.

.................................

The sheriff's Dept. Was still 'investigating' Vicki and her friend's deaths. Caroline didn't ask her mother how the investigation was going, were they making any headway?, were there any leads, suspects other then herself? Her mother didn't offer any answers to her unspoken questions either.

They kept to themselves more than usual. Her mother leaving for work before Caroline could come downstairs; although she never really slept and would spend hours telling herself to keep awake because she knew of a nightmare waiting for her at the end of a peaceful sleep.

She didn't go to school, Bonnie and Elena turned up once with different kinds of muffins and the same kind of crap coffee she had drunk before she'd laid her eyes on Damon, she ate the muffins and avoided the coffee. They tasted like cotton, everything tasted weird from the last few days, even her favourite toothpaste tasted like acid. Elena and Bonnie both tried being overtly chatty and normal with her. Sidestepping any mention of the murders, her role in them. Her bite marks were neatly covered with a black turtleneck so maybe it was easier for them to avoid asking her things they knew she couldn't or wouldn't explain.

When Bonnie went to answer her cell phone, Elena was doing that mildly interested in her surroundings and avoiding the uncomfortable silence thing, something bubbled to the surface for Caroline seeing her like that so unaware and blissful in that ignorance. It felt like a thorn pricking her lungs, making it harder to breath. It was too much... the memory of Elena and Stefan holding hands at the car wash and herself following a dark demon home. She got up quickly knocking the muffins to the floor. When Elena opened her mouth in concern Caroline beat her to it "This is all your fault Elena! It's all your fault...i hate you for this" Elena only stared at her for a split second stunned and hurt, the expression wore no comprehension or understanding, but it still brought tears to her eyes as she sputtered a confused 'sorry' and dashed out of Caroline's house.

Something inside her knew Elena didn't deserve to hear that. Maybe she had lost a friend. The simmering anger didn't do much to make her feel sad about it, just cold and numb. Bonnie didn't come back upstairs and she did not bother to go downstairs and look for her, she only stood in front of her full length mirror and pulled off the turtle neck she was wearing and rubbed at the bite mark on her neck, it hadn't quite healed...there was blood on her fingers as she pulled them away from her neck.

"_Aren't you forgetting something?"_

He was in her mirror now smirking with his hands in pockets, looking at her with an expression of maddening superiority and twinkling eyes. Caroline screamed and pulled the mirror down, it made a loud crash, the many shards bit into her legs and feet which already had many lovely scars on them. Her mother had charged into the room demanding to know what had happened and then seeing her called the police or an ambulance she didn't know because she fainted then.

Sleep was a difficult luxury to come by when you felt like you're life was in mortal peril and that no matter how many people promised to protect you they would always fail because they weren't highly trained vampire slayers or didn't know what they were fighting. For such people were the inventions of synthetic sleep medications and sedatives.

One such had been administered to Caroline by her family doctor, her mother had called the family doctor discreetly and checked for clues of break ins and cleared her out of her room and brought her downstairs and right now she felt like she was drifting in and out of consciousness trying to fight the effects of the drug, but it wasn't so weak after all and she didn't feel quite as strong after the last few days. So she gave in to the false sense of security and warmth the drug induced and let it lull her into gentle sleep with a bitter smile knowing what nightmares waited her.

.............................

A/N: i think two more chapters should do it, i promise there will be more action in the next two, tihs was the build up to them, but plz do review...

Thnkyou Mel, Rose and Rock'n'roll bitch for the great reviews!


	5. Chapter 5

Strange glimmering shadows rose and fell in the forest while she thrashed through some undergrowth looking for Vicki, her voice had quickly become hoarse because of all the screaming, the dark didn't let up and the crunch of movement behind her didn't slow down. She was aware she was dreaming, but this was different from her usual dreams, she felt like a tense spectator waiting in the wings and watching for some gut churning truth to unfold. She could see herself wild eyed, running through the darkness with her face the shade of her hair streaked with dirt and blood, her own for now. And she knew what was coming, not exactly, but there was an inkling of fear that she was about to see what she had avoided remembering for the last few weeks.

Her heart thumped painfully in her chest seeing Damon whiz by zig zagging through the night after her like it was day and the forest was his playground and she was his playmate. And then she saw that she had found Vicki huddled by a tree close to the camp site. The stupid, stupid girl, she was going to get them both killed. Caroline had wanted to scream at herself in the dream then, Damon was close by watching, hovering with excitement while she was trying to find out the cause of Vicki's backtrack. Soothing her like an idiot who knew how short on time she was.

Someone tapped on her shoulder then as if in real and she turned away from watching herself with Vicki, it was as if the air had paused, Damon's eyes were boring into hers, he backed her against some invisible wall in her dream and pulled her tightly to himself and she found her limbs unable to respond or for that matter speak while he sighed blissfully.

"Hello lover..." the lilt was still there in his voice as she tried to speak he shushed her gently pushing her against a tree while she struggled pointlessly the green of the branches glowing strangely now lighting the whole scene up like a movie set. "It's okay Caroline, i'm just here to show you what you 'refuse' to remember" she didn't want to look at him but that didn't stop him from continuing , he pulled her face roughly to himself "oh come on now...no snarly catty remarks? No more complaints about me not being the perfect Edward Cullen of your dreams hmmm?" He traced a half moon on the side of her face. There was a deathly scream somewhere behind them? In front of them? It echoed all around them ...Caroline shut her eyes tightly and Damon 'tut tutted' disapprovingly at her cowardice, still she refused to look at whatever he wanted to show her, no good could come out of it she knew but it was out of her hands as he lead her by knocking her down and dragging her by her hair under the yellow green glow of the tree she had found Vicki by.

"Damon let go, please don't do this ...please" there were tears of anger and pain that threatened to roll down her cheeks as he let her up holding her up by her arm in a bruising grip. She did not like to say please, it humiliated her to say it, her pride was well aware of it, and maybe that was what the pain she felt all over right now was.

He threw her in front of the already quivering form of herself and Vicki who were cowering under the elongated shadow of a bloody, unkempt Damon she remembered from the sexy car wash. She had the front row seats to Vicki Donovan's fate.

He smiled a fanged smile at them, with wild red/blue eyes "I got you now..." he told them with a smile in his voice. She wanted not to watch as he taunted them on their sense of navigation and pounced on them pulling each of them by their legs closer to him, he didn't sound like his usual crude self, but there was enough crudeness in the vulgar way he leered at their necks and the way their veins throbbed in their legs as his eyes swept across them, he seemed to be debating 'which ones first'.

Vicki did not really seem to notice what was going on as he first pulled her closer to him, she saw herself panic as he pushed back the brown tangle of her hair away from her neck lovingly, like caressing a much loved snack. Like a twinkie.

"Damon! Stop! You wanted the damn necklace, you have your damn necklace! You should let us go now" She noted the Caroline in her dream didn't say please, what a gal.

He quirked an eyebrow at her demand, thinking it over for a less than a second and responding with the rolling of his eyes in typical Damon style "I said no-such-thing, what are you stupid?...oh wait that doesn't even require an inquiry does it?" she didn't answer.

He dropped Vicki altogether suddenly from his embrace like a doll. He was bored with the simple drain till death routine and stood up bright eyed his gears shifting with all the drug laced blood he'd ingested "Let's play a game then, Your life for hers...you can go, if you kill her and to make it fair lets give poor Vicki-the- loser a chance, she gets a chance to fight for her life and if she kills you she gets to live, what do ya say???" He was crouching in front of her the stench of death and blood coming off of him in waves it was a wonder she hadn't gagged, she stood up to her full height trying to be her intimidating self "gee Damon I think...i think you're completely insane."

He smiled the without teeth i-just-want-to-hurt-you-for-that-totally-lame-crack smile "Maybe ...but you can't run from me and Vicki here is for all intents and purposes ...useless to aid you in your sprint to freedom" as an afterthought he added "unless you're willing to leave her here and run to save your own unwitting self???" he shrugged as if he'd given her all the assuredness he had the patience to give a rich slice of cake glistening with frosting, he would finish her off no matter what, better to try and make a run with Vicki. Or not, she wasn't sure now. He was planting giants seeds of despair in her mind and it was working to grow into something...really ugly.

He circled her chanting 'tick tock, tick tock Caroline, times a wasting...make up your mind'

She wanted to help herself, even though this had already happened and she had no control over what was unfolding, she couldn't wake herself up, the sedative had been heavy enough to make sure of that and Damon obviously didn't take kindly to her not remembering all this, her arms felt numb from where he was holding her prisoner a few feet from the dream version of herself, Vicki and Damon circling them, taunting them to kill each other.

She couldn't watch. Her conscience was slithering uneasily in her mind and she did not like it one bit. She might be a bitch but she's never in life physically hurt anyone. So far.

She found strength to speak even though it was useless, she could do nothing to change what had happened, the outcome would be the same but she still wanted to know "You have what you want why can't you just stop this? Why? Why"

He grinned at her like she was a silly child and this was a Disney land treat "Where's the fun in just letting you go hmmm" he nuzzled her neck as she shuddered in his hard cold arms whispering "i'll never do it you know?, i won't kill Vicki" She was saying it aloud more to convince herself.

He kissed her neck, folding her tighter to himself "Ah, but my dear in a hundred years i've seen humans thrive on the sense of self preservation, none of you worthless morons can stomach the idea of dying and be happy in the knowledge...besides the whole blind faith in the human nature thing doesn't really scream 'you' don't you think? It's boring, That's more Elena's thing"

She shook her head vehemently at his foreboding speech, he only smiled wider " Shhhh....just keep watching, you're going to love this!"

And she watched as Damon Slapped her around for a while because she kept refusing to agree or disagree and then as Caroline lay a little breathless fading in and out of consciousness, he went over looking deeply in Vicki's eyes murmuring things to her.

After a moment of scary silence Vicki seemed to spring up like a frightening wide eyed zombie and advanced towards the prone form of Caroline...He'd hypnotized Vicki or something because there was terror in her eyes as she saw Caroline's bloody form, she rushed at her emitting a large battle cry-esque sound and then they were both rolling around with Caroline trying to push her off while Damon stood surveying his handy work.

For some reason Vicki thought Caroline was a Vampire, three guesses to where that came from "You're not going to kill me you bitch!!" pow! That was a punch to gut she really shouldn't have forgotten, wow Vicki was strong even in a drug stupor, Caroline saw herself start to fight back, yelling at Vicki about lies Damon told her and that they were friends....but Vicki was having none of it she whipped out a switch knife from her pocket...somewhere Damon cackled loudly and wished Elena was here to watch this.

A very violent end to this climax was coming she knew, so she started to fight off Damon's arms the cold from them didn't cease to permeate, he didn't let go or let up. She didn't want to watch this. She couldn't. There were things she was not ready to see or accept about herself as a shallow person, yet.

They were fighting with the knife now Vicki was on top trying to stab her, she managed to give her a few cuts in the ribs, the pain stung like paper cuts and then she felt a surge of anger rippling inside her. Someone told her once anger was an evil thing and it only brought more evil, now she knew why because she grabbed the knife from Vicki without another though. Dream Caroline's eyes met with her own tightly shut ones for a second...there was terrible despair in them. Vicki blinked at her ...Caroline stabbed her. She'd closed her eyes but she heard Vicki's moan anyway.

She saw her own disbelieving face inches from Vicki not wanting to touch her but wanting to help her. There was nothing she could do. She hadn't wanted this but the end had come anyway. Vicki passed out or died she wasn't sure but there was a little dribble of blood from her mouth like the ugly truth of human nature presenting itself.

Damon chuckled collecting both girls in his arms with flourish, like they had won a relay race against each other and he was so proud of them. Dream Caroline was sobbing inconsolably while Damon told her how he knew when he saw her that she had 'it' in her, maybe he meant killer instinct, or the self preserving instinct she didn't know she was shaking still holding on to the knife.

He fed from Vicki immediately, but stopped after a while as if he were bored. Like he didn't just stage the whole sadistic play for his own personal entertainment. Caroline tried to crawl to safety into the moving shadows of the forest but he had a hold of her ankle and he wasn't letting go yet.

She tried to stab at his hand with Vicki's knife but he slapped it away and pulled her inch by inch leg upwards to him, she didn't have it in her to scream so she didn't. She could still feel her hands with the knife thrusting upwards under Vicki's rib cage, she could still feel the ugly, warm release of life from Vicki's body but none of this numbed her enough not to be angry at him. To hate him, she wanted to tell him it was his fault that he had made her do it, in her heart she knew that was the truth but she knew Damon would never admit what he'd done to her, he would only sarcastically remark about human nature and her stupidity, the urge to get away from him was overwhelming...but he didn't relinquish his grip on her.

The glow of the trees died out, her eyes couldn't even outline herself. The end was near and the silence between them seemed to stretch forever. But then as he had caressed and comforted her after the founder's day ball, he'd started to touch her hair and soon knotted a tight fist in them and pulled hard...her neck arched, the anger in her bubbled and broiled. She could feel his smile against her neck as she said a quiet, ice cold 'go to hell' in his ear and he murmured softly "Guess i'm still not over you" before viciously biting into her neck.

Everything went darker for a minute and then the forest lit up, maybe with her pain or maybe it was in her head but as it did she saw all the bodies Damon had drained that night in the forest and Vicki, a lone defenceless figure lying a few feet from them bearing a matching horrified expression.

The stupid crow was hovering over them flying in circles.

She screamed then. And someone tapped her shoulder again telling her to wake up now.

'-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

'Wake up now Caroline'

Her eyes snapped opened then, sweat had soaked all of her and she blinked hard to get some clarity, breathing hard she reached over for a side light, The hand that gave her a glass of water wasn't her mothers or the doctor's. It was Damon's and when she dropped the glass shattering it to pieces he didn't look worried or annoyed, just serious "Aren't you forgetting something love?"

Caroline stopped breathing, he touched her face, she inched away wondering whether this would be the end for her finally but all he said was "Your suppose to leave town ...get out of here or you're dead"

She felt her neck and the blood soaked bite on it and did just that. She left.

A/n: to those who are still reading thnkyou, plz do continue to read


	6. Chapter 6

Disclamier: don't own anything, except chip

Lyrics: live and learn - cardigans

I came home in the morning  
And everything was gone  
Oh what have I done  
I dropped dead in the hallway  
Cursing the dawn  
Oh come on sun  
Why must I burn  
I'm just trying to learn

I stared into the light  
To kill some of my pain  
It was all in vain  
Cause no senses remain  
But an ache in my body  
And regret on my mind  
But I'll be fine

Cause I live and I learn  
Yes I live and I learn  
If you live you will learn  
I live and I learn

"Hey kid? This your stop? ...hey, you aren't a run away or something?"

The bus driver was talking to her Caroline knew, she kept closing her eyes for brief intervals and then opened them to the sparse greenery careening by her window, it had gotten so many miles that she thankfully did not see any green any more. There was only barren land, other small towns, mountains and dead rest stops in between.

With the dream/nightmare still heavy on her she'd packed a small bag in not that big of hurry, picking up items in her room and putting them back down contemplating whether she'd need her many poetry books or not, her Jennifer Lopez Miami vice perfume? Did she need her Enrique cd's? The many hair care products that lay on her dresser unperturbed by the crumbled full length mirror shards sparkling and glittering caught her attention, she shovelled the styling mousses and the serums and the hair sprays in, grabbed the bare essentials to wear jeans, tops, scarves and underwear. She eyed her massive collection of shoes the many expensive dresses in her wardrobe fingering the silks and cottons contemplating their practically. After a moment she yanked those down off their hangers...Threw them on the floor in revulsion.

She'd always been a clean freak, many people thought this were the standard for girls like her, they expected a blonde cheerleader to be unflinchingly organized with her personals. And she was, It was a ritual for her to lay out everything in her wardrobe and re arrange every weekend her outfits, shoes and jewellery in a boutique satisfactory way. It made her feel proud and important, like a movie star or a model.

There was a small princess jewellery box she had painstakingly shoved at the very back of the wardrobe to keep it safe, there was a built in safe like contraption which had always been there as long as she remembered. She always kept money she made from school bake sales or fund raisers in the jewellery box. She was particular about handing money over to the rightful owner every time, it was one of her strange habits...maybe it's because her mother was the sheriff so no matter how nasty or greedy she was feeling in the end she felt obligated to do the right thing.

Today she was taking that money instead of giving it over to the school. She had become a murderer and thief all in one night or a couple of weeks. Or she had become all these things when she met Damon. Yes, she thought looking at the ruined state of her room she'd became all this in his guidance. Adding messy, disorganized and loony to the list weren't that big of a deal anymore.

She shoved the box in the bag she was taking and threw her shoes, poetry books, the many cheerleading awards and perfumes in the closet with her clothes and shut the door, holding the handle tightly like she was expecting it to burst open on her. Like something would reach out, grab her and pull her into the darkness. A shudder passed through her at the thought and she jumped away from the closet.

She looked through her drawers for something important, something she would need, like a weapon, but found nothing but fashion magazines, posters and pictures of actors she loved and hoped to meet someday...in one of the drawers she'd kept something of Elena's, her purse from when she'd visited her last time. At first she shut the drawer angrily but then she opened the drawer again, the purse was emitting an interesting...scent. She took it without looking inside.

She grabbed the set of twilight books in the drawer by her bed and looked around one last time, she was ready. Walking down calmly with her heavy bag, she'd taken her mother's emergency lighter from the kitchen, tore up and threw down her twilight books and Elena's purse in the lawn and lighted them on fire.

Her mother was out on night duties allot these days after the animal attacks on people and had left Caroline at home thinking she would not wake till late, it was four in the morning, nobody noticed the rising smoke and fire in their lawn as the books and their flimsy pages went up in flames the purse was still laying untouched on the ground beside the small burning pyre.

Caroline grabbed the purse shoved it in her bag and left without a backward glance at the burning pile or at her home. She wanted to leave her mother a note, at least she felt she should, but when she put the pen to the paper pad nothing came. She wasn't sure what she wanted to write? An apology, an 'i love you mum' note? A brief confession to Vicki Donovan's murder? A passage about the existence of Vampires in Mystic Falls? The address to Damon's home in the woods?

What was the right thing to do now? Implicating herself in all murders with a vampire label didn't seem the best thing to do, she wasn't even sure she knew the questions to the many answers that crossed her mind, She didn't know anymore. She didn't write anything, leaving it closed and empty. There was nothing better she could do so she walked for a long time in the dark, to get to the bus station, to leave Mystic Falls and hopefully Damon Salvatore forever.

................---------------------------------...............................

When the bus driver rounded another stop and asked her if she was a runaway again she got up quickly and got off, there were several stops in between, but she hadn't gotten off, it hadn't been far enough for her.

700 miles and 10 hours later they reached 'the City by the sea'.

The sun was overshadowed with dark clouds and there was a light pelting of rain as she got off and stood to take a look around. Someone bumped into her hard and uttered a profanity, she wanted to apologize to them but the words wouldn't come, her whole life had been about Mystic Falls and now it was ...what?

What was it? Was it the hard, fast, mean people walking past her, Was it gray skies, dark clouds and grey buildings? Was it the strange women walking past her like she was some alien species landed from a weird planet? Maybe it was, maybe it was all what she deserved. She hadn't even though twice before leaving her scared mother, concerned friends or the small, boring town she loved to be bored in.

But then again she'd never killed someone before had she?

Caroline steeled the tears in her eyes not letting them fall, she put her head down like the rest of the world around her, hiding her face and walked fast in no particular direction.

....................----------------......................

Got kicked in the head  
So I started a fight  
Cause I knew I was right  
But I learned I was wrong  
I remember a slaughter  
I remember I fought  
For the money I brought  
I got blistered and burned  
And lost what I earned

But I live and I learn  
crash and burn  
it won't be easy baby  
I got, I got it now  
She's got, She's got it now

"Hey Anne get your butt over to table 6 and clean up the mess, come on honey chop, chop now!"

Frank was yelling again, that meant he'd already called on her once and she had been dazed to notice. Caroline stammered an apology at the man and got a move on cleaning up the said table as quickly as she could while the owner of the small dumpy cafe she'd found work in shook his head, muttering about the fate of human race in the hands of slackers, the next generation.

The trade of prostitution would have been the easiest to slide into, if she had wanted, and she had given it a realistic and objective thought for a few days, it was just the thought of getting picked up by the police as hookers in the city regularly did make her think of all the troubles she might be trading just for some easy money. It was easier to work as a waitress where nobody would give her a second look, maybe only tip her nicely once in a while.

The pay at Frank's Cafe was crappy and the customers tried to grope her every once in a while but it paid the rent of the small beat up flat she had found on the second day of her arrival in the city. Every time a middle aged man or punky boy tried to feel her up she decided to change jobs and work in a nice expensive boutique but they would ask for ID or her real name and she wouldn't be able to give it to them. Besides she didn't have the clothes or perfumes to work in a place like that and the cafe customers tipped her well, so it worked. It's not like she had any outstanding expenses, she'd cut her nails short and let her hair grow, didn't have a phone or a real reason to own one. Who would she call? And who would call her back?

She bought a calendar though and hung it on the tiny refrigerator that worked sometimes in her room. Why she kept crossing out the dates gone by was strange even to her, it's not as if she was looking forward to some upcoming fancy school party or town function. Her evenings were a mash of floor mopping, waitressing, filling up salt, pepper and sugar shakers and counting cash at the end of the day, she'd scrub her flat clean every night for no good reason until she her nails bled and she dropped dead on her bed from just sheer exhaustion.

Sometimes she'd dream about being a vampire, chasing and killing her friends through the woods and then her mother shooting her dead in all her bloody Cheshire cat glory, sometimes she'd dream she had killed her mother after becoming a new vampire, Damon would be there every time approving, giving her new ideas to torture her. There was a bothersome sexual hue to some of her dreams because whenever she would dream of killing Damon they would end up making love on her bed, him telling her she could never have the courage to kill him before breaking her neck, the crack reminding her so much of the day she broke him out of his imprisonment and how he had snapped the neck of the man guarding him. And then she would wake up screaming in sweat and spit and throw around the meagre furniture in her room angry that the nightmares turned her on more than scared her, until someone shouted from next door to pipe down already. From time to time on one of her bad days she would wake up thinking it's time for school and she was late and wouldn't recognise her surrounding until after a couple of minutes.

It had been 4 months and 12 days since Caroline had run ...no, left Mystic Falls. Even after 4 months it seemed like the Caroline Forbes of Mystic Falls was someone from another lifetime her and Anne of the City had nothing even remotely common. She felt like she's been this sullen, drawn 'Anne' forever. She'd even come up with a story about her parents being drug addicts, abandoning her while still young so people would stop asking her if she's a runaway. Her behaviour certainly seemed to confirm it to her employer. She liked to think she was a good actress, because they never asked her personal questions anymore.

There were stacks of as many as a hundred paperbacks in a corner of her room, which she read through at one, go when sleep wouldn't come. They were cheap second hands but did the job of providing the least disturbing form of simple entertainment she could bare to have around her. All of them were either bitter comedies or cynical POV's, and then there were the sad tragedies that only made her frown. She made sure she avoided romances and mysteries because they never led to any good. At least the comedies and tragedies thought you a thing or two about snarky come backs and fighting dirty when the chips are down.

Caroline didn't own a T.V. But her window was an entertaining place to be at night, where the rest of the world was in full swing in spite of her, police cars regularly showed up around her building chasing some trouble maker or the other. Sometimes the sirens scared her, thinking this was it, they had found her and were going to come up tearing the door down any minute to put her in cuffs and drag her back to Mystic Falls. But they never did and the night mares slowly slowed down to occasional occurrences, she started feeling a little bit safe in her skin again.

Of course she still made sure her door and windows were tightly locked at nights and kept a switch knife under her pillow. But Caroline had gradually sunk into the monotone of city life as 'Anne' a hard working citizen and it made her feel contented just for a while.

A really short while.

.........................----------------......................

She made it a point to not look at any of the customers directly while taking their orders, always staring at the writing pad or at a point above their heads asking them what she could get them, often smile-less. Nobody ever seemed to notice or complain and that suited her about right.

So today just as she had finished mopping up a spill in the kitchen, the milkshake jug had exploded some reason...Frank yelled for her to get up front and take an order. Frank was always yelling about something, she sighed pulling out her small writing pad as usual and walked up to table 9 staring ahead above the guys longish spiky brown hair.

"Hey there, what can i get for you today?"

"Well, for starters you've got the most god awful beautiful blue eyes in the world and i would love for you to just look at me with them" The guy had a deep baritone voice that seemed at odds with his spiked hair and studded ear persona. She expected it to be raspy and annoying, He smiled at her softly, with knuckles clasped together under his chin, a red blue tattoo of a bird peeking from cuff and neck of his shirt, and he was waiting for a response to his obvious pick up line or whatever it was that he hoped she would respond to.

She ignored the compliment and asked again gritting her teeth what she could get him...He cracked his knuckles rather nervously "How's about you number Anne?" before she could let him know of her indignation he hurriedly added "you know Anne doesn't really sound like you...aren't you more of a Diane? Or Darla? ...Tess?"

That did it, she glared at him in her full I'm a bitch and you better beware glory but he didn't seem worried, before he could open his mouth and say something more she said an angry 'No!' he shrank back slightly but just not enough "Hey, i've been coming here for days and i think you're ..." She cut him off with another angry 'no!'

"Hey i just wanted to.."

"Are you going to order something or not?" she spat still unwilling to hear any other pick up lines, quirky questions or things he might have noticed about her. He scratched his head a little smiling an embarrassed smile, it wasn't such a bad smile, he put down the menu he was holding and swept his hair back a touch unsure of her demeanour "umm i just came to ask you out really..so.."

"No" She didn't wait for a reaction and turned around walked off stuffing the writing page in her uniform pocket, orange wasn't her most flattering colour so she knew the guy must be mad. She ignored Frank's glare of death as she stalked outside using the kitchen back door and stood in the cold alley crossing her arms over herself not a hundred percent sure why she was shaking with anger. It had been such a long time since anyone took an interest in her or her appearance, it made her feel conscious of herself suddenly, something she was only used to doing back home.

Caroline leaned against the door inhaling cold air, she could only marvel at the irony of someone asking her desperately for her number even though she was an unkempt mess and make up had faded out of her routine like she were allergic to it. How many days, weeks she would spend on her appearance trying to impress boys she liked, who seemed to never like her back, they were always trying to get to Elena, she pulled out the writing pad and tore it bits in annoyance at the memory of an old friend her old life.

As the torn pages flew about her unaware of her turmoil, she thought of the way he had sincerely smiled and the first thing he'd said to her "You have the most god awful beautiful blue eyes ...what kind of stupid thing is that to say to someone?" she wondered out loud, no one answered but Frank was yelling for her again, then she promptly burst out laughing.

And she laughed for a long time holding her stomach. The exploding of the milkshake jug should really have been some kind of warning to her.

A/N: i think one really long chapter or two medium chapters should do , we are near the climax, action in the next chapter i promise.

Rock'n'roll bitch im glad u are enjoying and continuing to read, yes i think u're write less ppl are into caroline and damon theres allot of Elena/ Damon, but i really like very unconventional couples. The more unconventional, the better.

Angelusfaith: thnkyou for your encouragement, it always makes me write better when i know someone is reading.

R


	7. Chapter 7

-...-

Sunlight permeated through her body.

There wouldn't be a sunrise she missed, even though that seemed cliché to her. She would already be up an hour earlier to rise and stay in her bed waiting for the sunlight to slowly filter through her. It wasn't so much as her element now as something to signify she was still here and living. Sometimes she managed to forget it, because she hadn't been this invisible her whole life.

The cafe was low on life today, not many customers, which meant more allot more grumbling from Frank and less cigarette and coffee breaks for the waitresses. The older waitresses would chain smoke there breaks away while Caroline sat with another paperback reading hungrily, and they would ask her secret to her being skinny, she knew the baby fat on her seemed to have toned out and she was thinner than before. It wasn't so much her own conscious thought as them pointing it out to her. Her jeans seemed to have become baggier and her vests and shirts less snug, cheekbones more prominent, she thought about getting some new cheap jeans for the hundredth time on her break and then dismissed the thought when any of the customers made a pass at her.

It helped in her silent quest to be invisible to the entire world around her.

Being invisible gave her the power to remain switched off from all and any emotional and physical contact she might have to make otherwise. Likewise her likeness to be touched with a friendly peck or pat was nonexistent, she only frowned at people or if very intensely required a smile, she gave them a lopsided quirk or her mouth.

Working on weekends came as a natural to her; she liked the certain dependency she felt on mopping floors and counters on the same time every day. The comfort of knowing and having a mindless and all physically encompassing task to keep her on her feet was almost therapeutic. Which is why when Frank muttered a sullen 'goodbye' past midnight, she actually smiled at him.

She liked having to lock up the cafe, sitting with the empty stools and tables in all their solitary, empty glory; it didn't gave her the creeps. It was ironic that paranoia never creeped up her spine at the mere thought of being alone. Why should it, she's been alone for months now. It was probably the only thing that made her comfortable now. The silence had a soothing effect on her nerves...sometimes she hummed in the silence. It was 'nice'. The front door was already locked, she loosened her hair letting it fall in long lose waves on her back, took a long sweeping look at the gleaming table tops and counters feeling proud of herself for accomplishing something remotely significant only to her.

Every month a waitress or two would complain about the bare tables and how Frank should think about nice flannel table cloths to dress the place up a little bit. Once in a while they even tried roping her in to convince Frank. They felt she and Frank were kindred spirits in brood and ignore, which she found oddly pleasing.

She could see why Frank wanted his tables to be bare, because he felt a certain satisfaction at the rows of sparkling clean surfaces staring back at him in admiration. it was good enough for her.

She switched off the lights and headed out the kitchen door. The alley was dark and quiet at this time of night, she didn't need a light, she wouldn't trip...the stepping into darkness seemed to have become a second nature to her. It was even appealing to just stare at the millions of stars above and reminisce about a different life somewhere else. Not that being nostalgic was good for her, the days she remembered 'things' was hard night for her to mentally shut down and shut out the rest of the world.

It meant more scrubbing of her floor and that was bad news for her already peeled nails. She never cried, oh no, the tears never came. but the feeling of being alone and friendless would haunt her until sleep eventually crept over her like a lovers embrace and then she would dream of her nightmares with horrid eyes and a nameless face.

It was a chilly night... her decision to not carry her one ratty jacket that would probably stop her from freezing over right this minute while she walked 25 minutes to home was looking like a bad one. She rubbed her arms to get the circulation going. It only achieved a millisecond of warmth.

And then a sound behind her made her go colder. Someone was there in the darkness with her, matching her slight footsteps, she wore something resembling tennis shoes...They were economical and practical but not completely soundless.

A deep throaty cough sounded behind her. Cold sweat gathered at the base of her forehead and between her shoulders.

Caroline steeled her body and stopped walking altogether. her eyes clamped shut in response to the shudder down her spine when the footsteps moved a little closer ...and then they stopped.

She muttered in almost barely above a whisper to herself 'Just keep moving Caroline, it's only in your head' she started walking again...the alley was long and there was no light at the end of it before it finished at the left corner. Her hands shivered as she tried to unzip her purse to get to her small switch knife. Someone was behind her watching her and walking with her. She didn't want to put a name to the shadow afraid that the heavy knife in her purse would seem too small and meagre a weapon to aid her if it came to a showdown in the alley with her nightmares.

She didn't fear the dark, only its implications for her and her companion walking in soft silence behind her. Wanting to turn around was an urge she suppressed very easily. Not knowing who or what was behind her was the only way she could focus on putting one step behind the other and continue on out of the alley. There was only one way to go...forward. So she continued onwards in hopes that the footsteps gaining a faster rhythm behind her was only a figment of her lately very wild imagination.

Only the sudden warm breath at the back of her neck felt very real...she wildly groped for the knife in her purse but it was already to late , strong arms and stale breath wrapped around her and pulled her back...hard.

It didn't occur to her to scream for it. "Hello sweetheart...where you goin?" hot breath tickled her ears and she viciously elbowed the owner of the voice, her elbow hurt, that was some thick muscle she tried ramming into. Mistake. Because he then grabbed her hair and yanked, the electric pain elicited a small cry from her...for a few seconds her hand went limp in her purse as the man who was pulling her back into the alley muttered some perverted things he'd like to do with her and also he wanted her money.

Damn.

When they were safely out of sight she felt a lovely sharpness threatening her throat. A pea sized drop of blood fell on her fingers, wetness slithering down her neck. He had a knife. A big sharp, jagged edge knife. She was still in his arms when he told her to be 'a good little blonde' and do as she's told, There was a white noise in her mind somewhere rising higher and higher, maybe it was her urge to scream or cry. But she wasn't sad, it was that simmering anger she had felt at the pit of her stomach when she'd purposely driven a knife under Vicki Donovan's rib cage.

And it was coming back, the familiar anger and indignation at her attacker. Caroline shut her eyes tightly again and made a final desperate swipe at her knife in her purse. Just as the man groped her chest, she clicked it open with frozen fingers in her purse and waited for the right moment as he loosened his hold on her just a little bit to unbutton her uniform. She let the noise in her mind overtake her limbs and vibrate through her...

And then opened her eyes and stabbed him hard in the right thigh. There was a scream then but it wasn't from her. The man dropped his knife in surprise and pain she imagined as he went to pull out the knife in his thigh; she had made sure it was deep. Then as if on autopilot her hand found the knife he had dropped, it sparkled with only the light of the moon. Before he could look up at her she took a running start at him and rammed the knife in his chest, buried it all the way up to the hilt in him. It was a gun she had she would have probably emptied the clip into him, She had knocked him over , he fell backwards, the sudden shock in his colourless eyes showed clearly even without light.

She stared down at him noticing the dark pool gathering around him...Blood. It was his blood. She thinks she wants to gasp, but nothing came. Glassy shocked eyes looked back at her blankly. Her vision had blurred slightly and there was tightness in her jaw which was giving steadily giving her a headed. The mysterious white noise had all but disappeared, it was all very quiet again. The only noise being her ragged breathing and her heartbeat hiccupping painfully in her ears.

Her hands were covered with the blackness of it, Caroline wanted to scream but nothing came ...a darker shadow whizzed at the end of the alley and the hairs on the back of her neck stood on their ends, this time her blood went cold. Damon?

Was it him? Has he found her?

She ducked and crouched over the dead man to get her knife, he'd managed to pull it out after all. Footsteps were coming at her steadily she wiped the blood from her hands and knife on the man and whipped around ready to stab at anything that moved.

Someone familiar was standing in front of her, but it wasn't Damon, he uttered a surprised 'whoa!' when she tried to swipe at him with her knife. It was the guy from the cafe, who thought she didn't look like an Anne.

"Hey watch it with that thing!..." he let his sentence trail looking at the dead body behind her, she thought of running and her feet made a move in some direction resembling out of the alley but most of her felt numb, with relief and a strange hollowing disappointment.

And now it was fear at the wanna be rocker's concern...he kept asking her if she was alright? Was she alright? She'd just about to be raped and killed and robbed, but she went all slayer on him and killed him. Strangely the first thing she asked him was what he was doing here?

The shadow? Was he the one lurking around? She didn't completely doubt the stalker complex after his repeated attempts at asking her out failed. He told her he was an artist, and that he was spray painting a wall behind this alley when he heard something resembling a scream.

He smelled like paint, there were patches of colours on his hands when he tried to smooth her hair away from her face.

She felt faint and sat down on rough floor next to the dead guy careful not to touch any more blood. She could've died. That could have been her instead of the man. Was she relieved to have fought back? Would it have been easier to succumb? How could she justify herself this murder with one unprovoked one already under her belt? Her mind groaned in defeat, Self defence could be a tricky little bitch to understand.

"He was going to hurt me..." was her only response to the guy's hundred and one questions. It's only when told her he was going to call for help that her senses asserted themselves rightly and she grabbed his arm a tad reflexively and held on tight "No police...please..."

"Hey...it was self defence...that guy was going to kill you...they'll understand, there are laws for this kind of thing" he tried to pat her arm and move away but she wouldn't budge.

"NO! No police, I can't talk to them" maybe it was the tremor in her voice, her dilated pupils, maybe the guy did not want to be some kind of witness, or he was not good with authority because he didn't press it. He just looked from the dead man to her and then back.

After midnight drunks and homeless people wandered in around here and she was guessing he was well aware of that, because he came to a decision "Let's move the body, come on..."

Caroline gave him a blank, terrified "Huh?" she sort of had an idea of what he was getting at but didn't want to show it. She felt slow on the intake, all her bravado earlier had been fake...she did automatically what her body told her to do to survive.

The instinct to survive had been greater then to let the bad guy win.

"You, me...let's move the body when the police come to investigate the dead body they won't connect it to this place...or you" some of his spiky hair fell forward on his forehead and there was cinnamon and cigarettes on his breath when talked to her.

Her mind was a whirl suddenly with all the questions the police would ask her if the man's death was connected to her, she imagined herself sitting in the observation room with beefy, bald detectives grilling her on her whereabouts and parents. If they discovered she was a runaway and murderer? She didn't even want to think of what would happen then...so when rocker guy asked her again "what do ya say?"

She nodded and kick started her body to work with her "I'll get the legs, you take him from the shoulders" She had to stay on top of this, it was not her fault, it was self defence. She was not an evil, psychotic bitch.

So they did the deed of moving the body from the alley to the next street, she picked his legs almost buckling under the weight of the dead man. She had read somewhere that dead people were heavier to lift, like Vicki; she had almost not been able to get out from under her. The memory of her shocked eyes almost made her drop the guy's legs.

But knowing passing out was a luxury she couldn't afford right now, she had to take care of this 'body'. Dispose of it. Dump it.

Her conscience winced pathetically and unfairly she felt for making her ask questions like who was this man she murdered in pretty much cold blood? Should she have asked for a name first? A last name? A mailing address to send a sincere written apology to his family if he had one? An anonymous letter to the police saying she hadn't meant to bury the knife up to the hilt in him?

They were stupid irrational questions but the night was turning out to be very irrational with the wanna be rocker guy who was helping her dump the body of a man she had killed. In self defence

She stopped for a moment in middle of the empty street bothered by something even more irrational and stupidly out of place "What's your name? I don't know you're name..."

He gaped at her for a couple of seconds like she was crazy still holding carrying the man from the armpits "I'm Chip" He humoured her, she'd give him that. She stared at him, something told her she was about to start giggling very irrationally and look like a psychotic bitch, so she swallowed the funny lump in her throat and looked at him with a straight face "You're Chip..."

That's who he said he was.

Chip looked about discerningly into the night like an anxious dog who wanted to play catch or bury the bone. Which was exactly what she should have been thinking about but the funny bones in her seemed determined to get a straight jacket worthy laugh from her, she hoped her expression remained unchanged and she did not scare Chip away for now. He glared at her "Uh yea...look I'm all for getting to know ya and stuff but what do ya say we finish this first?"

When she still hadn't moved he added for her benefit "Uh Anne? ...Body here? Needs a dumping place...police patrol car can swing by any moment? Snap out of it girl"

Out of the corner of my eye was a expression Caroline didn't use much, but now she noticed a shadow moving, lurking behind them, she blinked and it was gone.

That got her moving faster and more aware now she realised she must have been in shock earlier because now none of it seemed funny or worth a laugh. Nothing to do with her these days was funny. Not even a bit.

The shadow had to have been a figment of her imagination. It had to be.

...-...

It was true people in cities didn't notice allot of things, like a man trying to overpower a young girl in an alley or two people carrying a dead bleeding body to the other side of street. It was almost as if they all feared something. Fear of involvement. Fear of being visible.

Chip quiet the matter of fact about the whole thing casually suggested to her that she clean up and spend the night at his place just in case the police might turn up asking questions, it would earn her an alibi...the slight waggle of eyebrows as he said the word 'alibi' bugged her. She sighed heavily.

"No Chip, I can look after myself ok? You should just leave me alone now ok?"

The bird tattoo on his arm almost glowed in the moonlight, he had lighted a cigarette was staring at her critically in disbelieving, like they were comrades in a great battle and were now due to go and beer it up and crash. She be he was from California, something about the way he talked just screamed California.

Well there was that and then the very real tan. "Anne come on, we just partook in a major crime together...we're partners in crime...that calls for some major getting stories straight session"

She smiled her cruel smile and took another step back "Look Chip..i know you think we've finally bonded somehow but the truth is you just helped me move a dead homeless guy a found in my alley on my way home from work...and that means nothing, nobody is going to ask questions and nobody knows where i live...like you said I'm not even an Anne...so the best thing for you is to live your fantasy of buffy the vampire slayer in front of your tv... with some alcohol" after a beat she added "it might take the edge off tonight for you"

This was the longest speech she made to anyone in months. She wasn't sure why she let him know her name wasn't really Anne, he already looked like he couldn't figure out whether she was just broody and angry or both and obviously afflicted with some psychotic disease.

His look was broody now, a handsome look which actually suited him, she did not hint at it though, when he took another puff of the cigarette looking away like he found something else more interesting than a real live crazy she turned on her heel and started walking.

She heard the surprised 'hey' and the flick of the cigarette he threw away...and then his tall shadow that encompassed her, not in a really scary way until he grabbed her arm and turned her to face him. She looked up calmly into his sad, bewildered gaze...he wanted to kiss her or something, it was in his sad green eyes.

She liked him, this Chip but she hated that he found her some kind of irresistible warrior girl with a battle axe. Battle axes could kill. When his face hovered over her close to her lips she let him get close enough and whispered "Chip the last man who tried to grab at me is lying dead in the street"

His eyes searched her like he knew her, which was impossible, she almost did laugh at him then "That was self defence" he replied just as calmly.

"If you keep this up, there's going to be another self defence on this street right here..."

He let her arm go with a rapidly rising and falling chest and stepped away, but not like he had been burned. She felt disappointment for some reason, but elated at feeling stronger and in control.

She started walking away knowing he was watching her go. When she was as far as fifty steps ahead of him he yelled at her to at least tell him her real name.

That pleased and annoyed her at the same time for feeling pleased at all. She looked over her shoulder at him and yelled back "Choose one!"

Yes she liked to have the control in her hands, it was the Damon thing to do after all.

...-...

A/N: Hello all reviewers, i enjoyed each ones comments and look forward to writing more for all of you. Much appreciated guys. I hope the story is going well for everyone so far, Only one more chapter to go.

I already have an ending planned which is i hope fitting.

P.S: oh an in case anyone had trouble understanding why Caroline "Choose one" to Chip at the end of this chapter is because he asked for her real name and remember how in the last chapter he went on about how she looked more like Diane or Darla ?...i hope it wasn't too unclear.

I promise to rework the chapters and make improvements after i finish the story. thanks for your patience.


	8. Chapter 8

_Disclaimer: i own nothing...nothing but 'chip'_

_My love I've pictured this you're violet eyelids open to see here where you've been_

_You're lips open to say my darling it's been ... so very long and I'm in pain_

- Trespassers William - I know

….-...

Late.

She was late for work today. Her curtains were open to the angry view of the sky looking damned with grey clouds, the heavy chill in the air woke her up, her watch on the bedside table read 9:00 am. It was late, she'd always been the first one to work for 4 months. There would be questions and raised eyebrows today.

A dark speck on her watch's strap caught her attention. Maybe it was because of the white of her sheets that she noticed a dark red stain on the watch her mother had bought her for her 17th birthday. There were days when she questioned herself for not parting with it. Now she realized watches were for times like this. To remind you of a disturbance in your carefully created routine.

To remind you that chaos was just around the corner. And that constant vigilance was required …for a few weeks.

The dark speck of red on it reminded her of the murder in the alley the night earlier. A murder she most willingly committed. To save a life, her own and probably a hundred other girls like her who could have fallen prey to the deviant had she not done the deed. Of course these were things a killer probably told themselves to stave off the hefty guilt trip and some huge cover ups. She already had the cover up part down. All she needed was to let the guilt part mull itself over and over until the pep talk about it being 'The right thing to do' got the guilt dizzy enough and reverberate right out of her.

Chip, her seemingly Californian admirer had confirmed to her that it was indeed 'self defence' and she needed not to beat her self up about it because it could very well had been her body being moved to the next street or the sewers. Sincerity didn't exactly drip off of him in waves, He could have said all that for the wrong kind of reasons. Because he found her eyes beautiful and her face angelic.

Bull-shit.

She kicked off the starkly white covers of her bed and threw them in the tub with more than a handful of the strongest detergent she had available with a big dash of bleach just in case. She didn't check the sheets for stains, she just threw them in the tub and let them submerge under the cloudy mixture.

It didn't turn red. Her uniform from last night was somewhere …she couldn't remember. She remembered walking away after pissing off Chip, she remembered…not coming home. He was right she should not be at her flat right away after the murder, her land lady might have seen the blood stains and wondered or called the police. She was small prying lady that always tried making deductions and guesses about Caroline's past. And she did not want to give her a reason to be any more curious then she already was.

So she had walked all the way to the edge of the city , by the river and had found refuge under the busy bridge that stood of high stone columns, the cars going overhead sounded like live bullets but there was something soothing about the noise like a lullaby. It couldn't hurt her. She sat against a grafitied column under the bridge with the night melting away slowly. Despite the shock and horror the warmth in her body wasn't ebbing away. She looked down at her self and saw a sandy brown jacket on her shoulders and realized why her shoulders had felt heavy coming here.

Chip had put his jacket on her, she didn't have a clue about when. Maybe while she was still thinking what kind of name is Chip? Is it his real name? or is it his opposite to 'Anne' after they had dropped the body in a dark forlorn corner and started to walk away from it.

Yes she thinks, that's when he draped his heavy jacket on her shoulders. Maybe she had shivered too much. It smelled like him…cigarettes and cinnamon. Dawn approaching she wrapped it tighter around herself and let her eyes close. She was sure she'd fallen asleep under the bullets overhead.

Then how did she get home? What did she do with her uniform? Nothing jogged her memory about those two queries. She searched for the uniform wildly, until a flapping in her small balcony distracted her. The orange weirdness that was her uniform hung from sturdy pegs in the balcony, still sopping wet. There was not a spot of blood on it. Weirder that she didn't remember washing or hanging it, the jacket chip had put over her was hanging on her rack in the corner of the hallway neatly. Like it hadn't just been to a scene of crime, like it had been hers along.

She grabbed it and checked for stains…nothing. There was a faint tapping on her rooms window, she crept into her room slowly peeking from the edges of the door frame at the window. Something big flapped and flew away before she could see completely what it was, there was a loud squawking as it flew away. She only caught a wisp of something dark leaving her window. Nothing else.

For a moment Caroline stood in the middle of her room frozen in time… the tiny 'ticking' sounds of her watch seemed to echo louder in the silence or maybe it was her heart beating at a million beats per second. Possibly, she ran to the window and slammed it close, quickly.

It was too windy to keep it open anyway. Who knew what might come in. Yes, remember to keep this window locked she told herself. Safety first.

-…...-

The place was not abuzz with whispers of policemen crawling all over the place like she thought it would be. It was the same sort of casual half busy and half bored atmosphere in Frank's café as usual. He was pouring someone coffee at the counter and did not see her enter. But the other waitresses saw her, popped gum at her walking in two hours late to work avidly. She wanted to glare at them but only managed an uncomfortable flush as a greeting to the surprised looks.

If she didn't know any better under ordinary circumstances they couldn't care less why she was late but this was the day after the …'murder'. They were no ordinary circumstances.

She couldn't afford to look suspicious, so she threw her purse in the back and started looking for signs or whispers from customers of the police having been here. Maybe they had already come and gone. Maybe she had gotten lucky and they did not want to question her. After all she didn't look much of a suspect. Did she?

She was wearing a scarf around her neck to cover the slight cut which contrasted a bit oddly or wrongly with her uniform. Yes, it was a monumental fashion disaster but her uniform wasn't much of a winner in any given case so she thinks that it will slide for okay. Her watch was on her wrist again. And she should be worried about the speck of blood on it. But she wasn't. There was a strange confidence in her. Someone might confuse it with arrogance or compare it to the equivalent of strutting around naked…spattered with blood. But its' not, she thinks she can tighten the strap so it looks a part of the design.

That made her feel calm, she felt the familiar sense of homeliness looking at Frank doing his burger flips and scrambled eggs…the clatter of cheap cutlery and plates was just like the sounds under the bridge…she would be alright. Things would get back to …how they were.

Caroline ignored Frank's question of concern over the dark circles under her eyes, he didn't ask why she was late. She almost gave him her lopsided quirk of a mouth and told him she had customers to attend to. And she did, there was a bell on the café's front door…it chimed every time a customer walked in. Allot of times when greasy middle aged men who leered at her walked she would refer to the bell as the 'bell of doom'. Just as she was replacing ketchup, salt and sugar shaker bottles on all the empty tables the bell chimed and she turned just on reflex …just on reflex to see a middle aged man in a police officer's uniform walking towards her.

Bloody doom.

There was a new bottle of ketchup in her hand, she lost her grip on it seeing the officers shiny badge blind her momentarily… the bottle of ketchup rolled out of her fingers and slapped 'crash' on the shiny floor she had painstakingly mopped last night. In her mind the officer walked towards her in slow motion , she felt her eyes go wider and her lips formed a tight bloodless line on her face, all this took place in less then five seconds. Until he walked past her looking at her as if she were the strangest species of teenage waitresses he had come across, he went to the counter sat down and pulled off his cap, asking one for the other waitresses for coffee.

Caroline was glued to the spot. Literally.

As the fear of being handcuffed and dragged away left her, queasiness circled in her belly, the ketchup bottle had literally exploded at her feet, her shoes were covered in the murky red thickness. The police man was studying her from his perch on the stool at Frank's counter, while she was still trying to find the best way to deal with the mess.

Her first instinct was to get to the mops and buckets and get mopping but her feet remained rooted to spot for a bit too longer then necessary, there was something about the sauce all over a clean white floor that made her think of the way the man last night had landed on his back with the knife sticking out of him. How the dark pool of blood had blossomed by him as she had stood a few minute feet away just like this. The pool of blood. Oh shit. She ran to the back door not caring who she might be crashing into on her way, there were some surprised yells but nobody tried to grab for her.

The blood in the alley, she hadn't thought of getting rid of it, and if someone's seen it already…it was all over. She opened the back door and a flash of rain fell on her as she struggled to move herself forward to the exact spot she had fought and killed the man. Her heart hammered in her chest and by now she felt like she had had several mini heart attacks since last night. The ketchup clung to her shoes and legs heavily, as she walked in to the alley farther and farther her vision seemed to darken, maybe it was a side effect of becoming a loony. She kept glancing back to see if someone had followed her. No one had. It felt like walking in the woods again, the wind whispered wicked sounds and her body felt like it was closing in on it self in pain, or was it her mind? Her feet automatically stopped where it had all happened. She gave it a risqué glance, like looking too closely might hurt her eyes.

There was no flash of wet redness on the ground, No blood, nothing.

She walked back and forth in the entire alley with wide eyes…she could be very well be mistaken about the spot. But the ground was dirty with scraps of food, of newspaper paper, other assorted crap and there was the smell of cigarettes behind her.

Something cheery asked her "Left something there?"

She turned around, it was Chip, lounging against the dirty wall taking a drag of his cigarette, his spikes were a bit mussed because of the rain but other then that he looked just as nonchalant as he had been yesterday about the murder. He blew smoke in her direction when she didn't answer him right away.

"There was blood here…" she started "I forgot all about cleaning it up.." her mouth felt dry and she licked her lips nervously looking at the back door of the diner, what if the police officer came to investigate her running frantically after seeing him?

"I took care of it" he said still casually looking behind her like he was expecting someone too. Caroline's mouth opened and closed like a fish but nothing came out.

"Don't sweat it Princess, I wiped it clean after you twinkle toed your way into the night without a thank you or …an address" he took another minute drag of the cigarette just to irritate her and then added "Without a name" She leaned against the dinghy wall for support and found herself sliding down against it instead, who knew what kind of slime was covering the back of her uniform, she didn't care for a moment knowing there was nothing else to link her to the crime.

"You know what you need?" Chip asked her deadpan as she sat there slightly panting for breath "You need a smoke…" That did it. She half got to her feet and pushed him until he yelled a "Hey! Watch it! inflammable substance here!, what the hell's the matter with you?".

The rain was getting heavier now and pretty soon it would soak through her ruined uniform is she didn't get in, she crossed her arms very lady like and stood to face Chip. "You! I told you to leave me alone? Why don't you just go away!"

"I told you that this whole tough chick, Buffy the night lurker's slayer isn't going to put me off aright?"

Glaring and looking pretty were not her forte but she did it anyway "No you didn't Chip"

At least he had the decency to look sheepish when he said she was right he hadn't said that but maybe he had thought of saying it, but she had looked so intense then he had been afraid of her whipping out a knife at him and following through with her threat. She rolled her eyes at that and started to walk away, this was pointless…Chip's unnecessary childish pursuit of her like some kindred rock spirit of his. She didn't like rock and he was the complete opposite of what she would have dated, if ever.

But then again her type or brand of guys was supposed to change as her status from small town cheerleader to city waitress/murderer. No? He seemed to think so, she called him 'crazy', and he responded just as she thought he would "right back at ya princess"

The ketchup on her cheap shoes and uniform were starting to irritate her "Stop following me and don't call princess" He did not obviously stop following her to the back door "Well...if you'd tell me your real name then I'll stop calling you princess…princess"

She wasn't sure if she knew how to snarl really, being broody and glaringly friendless got people off her back without even trying, this Chip was a though, annoying one to crack. She tried to supply another realistically fake one that could be overlooked. "My name is…Bonnie ok?" He stared blankly, she stared back "Now shoo…"

Chip pulled back his hair like the first time they met and he smiled the toothy grin of his which was slightly daring and embarrassed, he made a fake buzzer sound "Yeah, i don't think so …the truth has a better ring to it …you're not a 'Bonnie', I can tell"

She could have spent the time arguing with him and asking him how the hell could he tell she wasn't a Bonnie ? She could be a Bonnie if she wanted to be Dammit. In the end the soaking rain, Frank's yelling from the deep recesses of the kitchen and her exasperation of Chip's determined gaze won out and she gritted her teeth and told him.

"Caroline, I'm Caroline" It felt like ages since she said her name or hear anyone repeat it which is why when he mouthed it like it was something tasty and good she was fascinated by the smile that broke out over his features, she felt the corners of her lips quirk a bit too but then remembered why she had been out here in the first place and told him for a final time to leave her alone. Frank asked her who she had been talking to when she came back in when she didn't answer he just shrugged and told her smoking was bad for her, She agreed with him on that one completely.

Chip left muttering something that suspiciously sounded like 'See you later, princess' she smiled to herself brushing the broken ketchup bottle away, she knew he really should have listened to her.

-...-

The mirror in Caroline's experience never lies to you, even if you intend to lie to yourself and tell yourself differently a mirror always holds a true real-time picture of you that can throw you for a loop if you're not steady enough.

And there was no way Caroline was steady today, she was going to see Chip…

This had not been a development that had been brought about easily, nor had she willingly signed up for it, its only after his repeated attempts to talk to her at the café's or when she ventured into the alley behind the café, He was one mean stalking machine, that Chip. There were more whispers among other waitresses who passed some snide remark when she passed by, Frank was becoming impatient with her and kept looking at her as if he couldn't decide what to do with her. Not that her behavior was much different from the last four months, apart from the constant run ins with Chip and sometimes the same police man that had walked in a few weeks earlier had her on edge, the number of things that fell out of her hands were getting fewer…the cutlery and condiments were relatively safe in her company now.

So when Chip at his last straw asked for her company to the largest and oldest suspension bridge in the city with a quasi threat of tattling/setting the police hounds on her unless she agreed to come with him, Caroline had stood at the counter both seething and a hundred yards uneasy at his assurance that he would make an anonymous call to the police and tell about the murder and the moving of the body with the relevant details about her whereabouts and her first name.

This time he didn't wait for her to respond and just left her gaping after him. It was a good strategy because although she couldn't take Chip seriously, most of the time, and yet she couldn't completely ignore the half-baked threat. This was not her caving in.

The small mirror in her bathroom showed a slight glow in her complexion even though the vestiges of the last known smile on her face were non-existent. There was no make up on her face but her cheeks were slightly red as if she were embarrassed to be consulting with the mirror for something resembling a date.

No, this was not a cave in or a date. Not.

-…...-

"Hey come on, don't be like that" Chip asked her for the hundredth time, as she half covered her face when he tried snapping another picture of her. Chip was a big tech freak. Planes, Trains, automobiles, bridges and towers were obsessions that were photographed by him as a hobby and sometimes freelance work. Every time he conversationally tried snapping a picture of her she'd self consciously cover her face and spoil his take.

She didn't want him to have any more ammunition to black mail her with. Hence her meeting him early morning in front of a steel sculpture that looked like a huge metal globe. She expected gloating and a big guffaw of obnoxious confidence from him but all she was greeted was with a broad smile and a benevolent twinkle in his eyes. He was glad she came. As if he hadn't expected her to really come.

That alone should have made her dash back the way she came but when 'Thank you' was all he said and started walking off expecting her to follow, she had followed him as he led her by the river banks side talking constantly about what she could no longer remember. She was busy observing the rotting wooden stilts in the sand and the dark river rushing by as they walked for over an hour with Chip randomly snapping pictures.

She had neglected to take a walk here and discover this path. Something about the semi demolished atmosphere spoke to her, she felt awake and interested for the first time in a very long time. They passed by an abandoned old fashioned railway station which had been closed down in the 80's. The structure with it's brick and mortar still stood strong and had nests of doves higher up in its empty dwellings. Some of doves flew about the railway station in a circle, they looked comfortable in the knowledge that their permanent residence was out of the reach of any predatory disturbance.

Chip's knack for saying something completely out of place inserted itself here, he told her the structure reminder him of her….the weight of the world on her shoulders'. She let herself smile just a little, he had no idea. Caroline humored him because of how serious he looked when he said it, she asked him why then the gigantic metal globe didn't remind him of her, it had all the right emphasis on shoulders and weight's after all.

He spread his arms and looked up the structure when he talked.

"This thing here's got beauty Caroline…sure it isn't up and running, its all tragic but its better than just a big a ball of cold metal…its got some life" Beauty and Tragedy, this is how he saw her. He didn't even know her to make it sound like her sound like she was a magnificent piece of art he would love to own.

That disturbed her, his lack of understanding to stray away from topics that made her uncomfortable. Deeply intimate and meaningful compliments she has never received from anyone before only made her more irate. That and he snapped a picture of her unsuspecting looking at the railway stations dark gritty walls with a grim finality.

She quickly walked on and this time expected Chip to follow, which he did.

-…..-

After two hours of walking straight without water or proper walking shoes, they had made it to the suspension bridge the plaque said it was built in the early 1900's. it overlooked a deep recess in the ground and undergrowth, the river under it seemed a million feet away.

While Chip had snapped away picture after picture enthusiastically, Caroline was preoccupied with the impending gloom of the rain overhead which was due any time soon now. She felt tired and her feet hurt. The cheap tennis shoes look-alikes were not meant for climbing 300 steps up a mountain to find the path that led to this bridge.

They were meant for walking on squeaky clean floors of diners and walking home from work. Chip ever the observant only guffawed at her expense and offered her his hand as support. She didn't take it just pushed on back downwards.

There was light pelting as soon as they got to ground, leaving behind a silhouette of the suspension bridge far up behind them, Chip had stopped chattering since she had started grumbling about the long trek and her swollen feet. At one point when they were back walking beside the river towards the city she felt a slight pang of guilt which was unnecessary on her part. Maybe it was the silence with someone who viewed her as something other than what she was trying to appear that bothered her. The silence gave him time to observe her. Closely. Well, she did fall into a muddy puddle halfway down because of him. He was holding her by the arm firmly now talking about his apartment nearby and that she could get cleaned up and rest a bit before going home.

Yes maybe that's why she felt guilty or angry with him.

She did not want to go anywhere with him, a very small crazy part of her was curious about where he lived, how his place looked, did he have a chock load of grunge paintings all over his walls? was he messy? She bet he was messy and disorganized. The rational, together part of her knew this was not a good idea. Going anywhere else with him would just…not be good. Her mind said that but she couldn't put a good reason to it. He was not threatening, yes he was rather muscled and rough around the edges, the tattoos were expressive of art and colours more than some angry rebellion. But there was nothing brutal about the phoenix in blue and red over his arm. There was nothing cruel about his smiles or his jokes. He was safe. Or seemed like that.

Not taking into account that he did threaten to tell on her.

Her feet felt broken, she stopped walking and Chip stopped walking with her. She couldn't go on anymore if her life depended on it, so she sat down on the pavement refusing to budge. When he plonked down next to her with a cigarette Caroline wondered not very loudly what kind of shoes Chip was wearing, the guy was virtually and physically tireless. She sighed loudly; this had to end "You can leave now you know? I can really take it from here"

He puffed a large cloud thankfully not in her direction, it sounded like his version of sighing over her "You and what member of the totally smashed army is going to get you home if I leave?…beside's, it's getting dark princess" He looked at her sideways critically, "You know how dangerous that gets".

She knew about varying degrees of darkness that he was referring to but she liked not to be reminded of it, her anger only seemed to incense him to be more forward, say more cryptically intimate things that she liked and hated herself for liking at the same time. So, instead of getting angry she decided to tackle the real problem she had with him "Why don't you just leave me alone Chip?" She was looking at him very straight now " This is really not going to work… I don't even know what you want from me"

The only thing she got from him was a non committal grunt.

Chip was expecting this or had prepared for this maybe that's why he kept chattering from the moment she joined him in front of the steel sculpture to keep her from getting to this point before the day got over. The magic of the mysterious path had worn off, she was tired beyond belief and she was not going to play any more games. It came to her while she waited for a response from him that he had planned to tire her out, so she couldn't turn on her heel and run, he was a bit thoughtfully sneaky like that.

"Because I like you, ok? And I know that somewhere in a less crappy, gloomy & loner corner of your little itty bitty heart you like me back too…so why don't you just shut up and let this play out the way it does…hey, im not even asking for any money back guarantees or anything if nothing works out ok?...Now come on.." He said getting brushing himself off, the cigarette had been long forgotten, he offered her a hand and this time she silently took it. He told her if she did not want to freshen up or rest at his place he could drop her at hers. The idea of him knowing where she lived so quick made her uneasy, the going to his apartment wasn't much better but she figured it was the lesser of the two evils or dangers however you looked at it.

The sky was darker now, something dark flew among the clouds haunting them, she felt a familiar chill up her spine and looked at Chip reflexively.

"I want to see your place…"

He muttered something like 'progress' and Caroline followed him forgetting the pain of her feet.

…-...

Shock was a word that came to mind when she looked around herself for the second time. They were at Chip's small apartment which she had imagined not be alike hers at all. Neat, clutter free and …clean. These were three things she did not expect to see at his apartment. It was neat freak clean and remarkably empty like hers…There were no pictures or paintings hanging that she could see, no set of drums with dirt laundry hanging over them. Maybe he was more of a guitar person?

She could not have been more wrong about his personal surroundings hygiene.

It smelled lemony fresh, things didn't exactly sparkle but she imagined neat freak cleaning was a bit overrated, in Chips case it was as good as it was going to get. She was summarily impressed with his organization skills.

Chip had changed shirts and offered her a change of clothes as well. Caroline had refused, instead she opted for scrubbing at her mud crusted top and jeans with a wet rag that Chip handed her on the way to the shower. He made her tea, sweetened and told her it would help with the sore legs and feet, it was a very tame mad hatter moment she half expected him to giggle. But he was perfectly serious and perfectly gentlemanly. Wow.

She tried another unsuccessfully dig at cleaning herself up and stopped. The mud on her seemed to have a life of its own it spread further along the contours of her top as she tried to wipe away at it. As if it was multiplying. She looked like a sexy car wash model, the idea of a long loose fairly unattractive shirt wasn't so unappealing now. The shower was still running, maybe she could rush into his room, find the shirt and put it on. He would grin shamelessly and it would be one of those things he'd never let her forget but it was better than him staring at her through her top.

The small bedroom was as neat as the rest of his apartment, Everything was in its place, still no drums or guitar. The shirt he had offered her lay limp on his small bed almost big enough for two. He had blinds, no curtains; no tell tale pictures of family or friends displayed at the small desk in the middle of the room. There was something almost clinical about his house keeping habits. Something they shared. After a moment of hesitation she slipped her muddy shirt off and let it land on the floor as she unfolded and viewed chip's oversized red t-shirt with some non descript angry lyrics, her eyes fell to his bed again, there was a large blue folder peeking out from under his shirt. It seemed full of lose papers. She was as private a person as it got but the blue folder on his white sheets felt ominously attracting.

Caroline felt a vibe of dread creep up inside her as she flipped it open and stepped back as if she expected to be burned or scarred or both.

They were sketches. Pencil, charcoal blended with skill and passion, translated into natural scenes. There were sketches of smaller bridges in the city, some old people and then there were sketches that made her gasp slightly …she was looking at sketches of her in different expressions. There was a sketch of her in angry charcoal looking…well angry. It must have been when he tried to ask her out the first time.

There was a sketch of her looking lost and serene doing her mopping or scrubbing like he'd taken a picture of her from the window. Another one of her slightly smiling at someone but not quite, the spark in her eyes was almost real. And then there was one more of her in soft and dark hues of grey looking up at something, her eyes read like fear in it and something else, pain. The night of the murder. He had captured the way she had looked in the sketch...harried and bloody with the silhouette of something unmoving on the ground. Caroline stumbled away from the folder… she groped for her shirt in the air, still backing out of the room and ran smack against something hard.

"Hey…"

Chip was all fresh and clean smelling with his hair swept back, suddenly she realized she was shirtless and sweating. She wanted to say something, leave, but felt her vitals completely unresponsive.

The hyperventilation buttons on her felt floored as she tried to move away…images of bloody knifes and fangs distorted her mind, Chip was around her, close to her backing her into the wall trying to distract her from her murderous memories. She heard herself saying 'No..' her cheeks felt wet with a tear of two but he brushed it away. He kept telling her 'no one would hurt her', she found it hard to believe, and wanted to escape with her conscience running tight circles in her belly. But his arms were slightly around her blocking her escape but not quiet, she supposed it helped that he was taller and muscled in the right places to stop her if she tried to bolt for it.

Caroline made a move, a very small one, to push him away, but felt herself backed completely against the wall, his hands were hovering over her collar bones, arms and hands, all the while gently shushing her protests, "it's okay…it's okay…" She shuddered, her attention wavering at the window. Chip hadn't touched her yet, Her heart fluttered in her chest like a small birds, She felt small and vulnerable in his almost not quite embrace, disconcertingly.

His voice went huskier as he bent down and pulled her chin up gently to look in her eyes, there was nothing menacing in them, just soft adoration of something resembling respect, some concern and a very small spark of lust glittered in his green stormy eyes, he didn't give her enough time to understand whether he was just exploiting her vulnerability with his gentle maneuvering strength. Chip spoke again 'Trust me' he said. And instead of running out the front door she did, trust him …a little bit. Maybe that's why when his fingers clasped hers completely she protested no more as his lips met hers and his arms closed around her firmly.

Maybe he had stages everything just to get her to this place, just to maneuver her into exploiting her vulnerability, but he felt safe. Safer than she had felt in the last few months and her muscles were slowly unclenched and melted into….nothing, with him.

The shadow of something dark squawked passed the window in front of them but neither of them noticed it.

-….-

It was late…

Late night when Caroline snapped awake, she felt warm and aware of being somewhere else. Somewhere that wasn't her place. The slightly cold, wet feeling from her muddy top was still there…although she wasn't wearing one. She felt something weighing her down, it was too dark to see…her wrist watch showed something past midnight, she groped around for a light switch.

Found it.

Light spread over her in a soft circle, slowly her gaze dropped down to her chest and she became aware of a man's muscular tattooed arm draped over her and the sheets covering them. They were white the last time she saw. In the soft glow of the light deep red wet stains stood out on them.

It was blood. She was covered in blood that's wasn't hers again. And this time couldn't find a voice to scream.

-…-

A.N: Hello readers, thank you for showing the tremendous support you have shown for this story. I appreciate it, I miscalculated though, there needs to be one last chapter after this in which Caroline faces off with the big bad. I tried to put as much as I could without completely rushing this chapter but ultimately the showdown between her and Damon needed a chapter of its own. Hopefully I haven't bored u with this chapter.

R


	9. Chapter 9

-…-

Shades of light and dark flipped like a switch signaling day and night to her sitting in the corner behind her stacks of paperbacks…As if they could hide her, she was still in her apartment, still in her soiled clothes, still had her eyes shut to the rest of world around her. She couldn't tell if hours or days had gone by, the slight breeze of the night alerted her to its presence. When sun light pricked her eyelids she knew it was light. But she did not open her eyes to any of it. She couldn't bare it right now.

Something akin to pain persisted in her lungs and her back. The damn crow was squawking and circling around her building like an executioner on the round she knew even from here. But Caroline refused to acknowledge its presence. It sounded like it enjoyed her persistence in ignoring Damon's presence which was hovering over her mind and surroundings like a dark cloud of anticipation.

The fear still did not come.

It felt different this time. She felt dead. Her heart, if you could classify it to feel any emotions … felt numb. Her legs felt cramped with the knees crushed against her chest, she was holding herself tightly. As if she let go the air around her might disintegrate her existence. It felt wholly possible.

After some time the chaos in her mind had started to slow down somewhat, like room overflowing with too many things whose door you finally manage to close. Not because the room was finally empty but because you had to get the door shut no matter what or else you might drown in the chaos on the other side. Maybe it was because the numb feeling. But even as she kept her eyes and mind closed to the sounds around her, the flashes of bright red over blue tattoos and dead green eyes sent a current of nightmares to her whole body and she shook, her knees knocked together.

She did not expressly cry but the scenes of her kissing him back and following him to his bed kept playing again and again. How their hands clasped each other's…how their weight made the bed dip and her limbs felt on fire after a long time. The way they locked gazes briefly, hers grey ones with his darkening green ones, his head disappeared to side of her neck, the room spun a little in different colors and her memory blanked, or she wanted it to blank. Either way she did not want to think or remember what had happened.

Not that, that defense mechanism would hold out for much longer. She was sure one

way or the other she would have to face the horror all over again.

She kept seeing Elena's purse in her nightmares…picturing herself taking a vial of poison from the purse and downing it in one gulp determinedly. This was a purse she had not bothered to open and look into since she arrived here. Strange that she would dream about it so intensely now. Someone Elena maybe Bonnie, she wasn't sure kept telling her to drink it.

They were right she should do it, end it right now. And then they would all see her on the news as the teenage murderer who took her own life after two others. The crow croaked in some kind agreement.

…..-…

It was dark again when her mind was no longer a safe place to retreat into. She heard him. First she thought it was Chip. Asking her why? And then just when she almost caved in, a decidedly evil voice would laugh at her, the menace in it was not unfamiliar. Mocking her for her almost cave in. And this would repeat until she fell asleep from the exhaustion of it all.

She dreamed it then. The night at Chip's Apartment, her letting him close in on her and letting her muscles unknot slowly…she had felt engulfed in his warmth and it felt good. There was not a single whisper in his apartment. You could drop a pin in the room and hear it land with a piercingly tiny shriek. The moment had built up and carried them overboard, she felt on a different plane, not because she had many other encounters to compare this with but because it had been so long since she had allowed another live …being to be this close to her, to trace the contours of her face with such care. It allowed her to lose herself to the sensations so completely, that she had shut her eyes as Chip's callused hands slipped under the nape of neck and knotted themselves in her hair… He had whispered her name then; his warm breath tickled her neck invitingly. The response struggled with silent lucidity inside her as his lips resting on her neck parted just a little and, he bit her…hard.

Caroline's eyes flew open. He had bit her? She wanted it to stop, stop showing her what she unspoken had refused to keep memory of, Still she couldn't stop the scene from unfolding in her mind. Her hand disappearing to the back, she pulled free her switch knife which she had tucked in her jeans.

The knife's blade shined with unnatural light as she raised it above them and stabbed Chip in the back. Over and over, he had only looked so shocked when he tried to ask her out on a date the first time. A light trail of blood trickled from his mouth as he slid beside her into un-ending slumber with his tattooed arm still securely around her. Warm wetness slid over her and the starkly white sheets, more blood. She had let go off the knife and stared up at her hands…they were as bloody as when she had driven a knife into Vicki Donovan. She was in hell, that had to be it.

She was reliving her…mistakes?

Something snapped her out of her bloody reverie, the window across the room made a noise. Someone had tapped it. She froze as her eyes met icy gaze Damon's across the room. He smiled slowly, like danger sliding over thin ice and his eyes lit up when she noticed him. Every cell in her body told her to get up and run or scream or somehow open a void so deep that she could fall into it and he couldn't follow her. But nothing of that sort was going to happen, she knew too well. Hell wasn't a land of opportunities, or escapes she imagined.

But Damon made no move to come in, as she lay motionless under Chips arm he only silently applauded her. Although she couldn't hear the 'clap' of his hands they felt like thunder across her face. She did not need vocals to read the expression on his face. Evil laced with something which reminded her suspiciously of a proud parent or a mad scientist. Or both. Like he had created a monster.

Caroline wanted to heave, but there was no room to move, she only watched with sweat trickling down her spine as Damon looked at her again pointedly, licking his lips and then slowly deliberately moved a finger across his throat…It rang of challenge and no second chances. His apparition disappeared suddenly and only the crow remained watching her with its air of vengeance.

It was her turn now to die or kill …him.

-…..-

It was dark out as Caroline gathered her things into the duffle bag she brought when she came to the city…she filled it up with everything she needed and then headed out, the bloody clothes were stripped and left in a pile on floor. It wasn't going to do her much good to clean them up for inspection of evidence. There was no time to scrub her place with bleach. She wasn't so sure she cared any longer.

She emptied her drawer, it had nothing in it except for her hairsprays she had never used and Elena's purse. Which she had never opened, for a moment in the frenzy of making a quick getaway she stopped at stared at the purse of her childhood friend who had only meant infinite goodness to her. She wanted to be angry again and be able to hate Elena. But the memory of her finding Caroline in the grass in the dark, at the founder day ball after Damon had bitten her with intent to kill her sparked something else in her entirely. Sadness, hurt and some kind of affection. Elena might have saved her then, and she had been too self serving to care. Maybe still was, her vision blurred slightly but she did not allow the tears to escape. There was no time for that either. The being shallow and bitter with anger was the only thing that would not betray her confidence at the hour at hand.

She had to make her move. Now.

She took the items out of Elena's purse, a ring, a necklace and a bottle of something liquid, it smelled like alcohol, so much for the poisonous theory…She left her flat not looking back at it, only an envelope of money she pushed under her landlady's door was her only appreciation for a roof over her for so many months. Going to Frank's crossed her mind and she dismissed it immediately, there was no point of going there to say good bye. It was better this way.

Frank wasn't much into goodbye if he was anything like her and the other waitresses were bitter waste of spaces maybe allot like her too. Besides if they found Chip's body it was pretty much game over, she was sure she had left plenty of evidence to help the police make the connections. That was her only saving grace for any redemption in the after life. To let them brand her a murdering psycho. It would leave allot of unanswered question like why? How? And wasn't her mother the sheriff?

Small town sherrif's cheerleader daughter turned murderer.

They might blame her for the way Caroline turned out. There was comfort knowing someone other than her would be blamed after it was all over. Yes she was still self serving and shallow.

She made a brisk walk to the quiet path she and Chip took to see the suspension bridge. His memory brought twinges of pain but she did not stop walking, she was wearing her shoes which were not meant to long distances. She wasn't in love with him but knew somewhere she had loved the idea of Chip being around her unwanted or unassuming like a good, slightly odd dream with a side of nightmares. He was an unconventional friend. An unconventional vampire friend. That part she had never known. She was so sure he was safe. Safe and protected.

Old habits die hard, maybe that's why she had trusted him. She dumped most of her things from the duffel bag into the river, it looked especially red in the dark tonight.

-…-

The crow was following her just like she had imagined it would. Caroline continued her trek, quickening her step with footfalls behind her and a high pitched squawk above her. She needed to get to the bridge. The bridge, which had been her haven for many months under whose darkness she had slept the very first night she came here. Nobody came here, no one would see her or hear anything. It was the perfect place. For another murder.

The grafitied columns under the bridge were especially ominous this night, the bullet like sounds from the cars above did nothing to soothe her anymore, she gulped down Elena's bottle of liquid for some kind of courage…if it was poison …she would die anyway, Fear had creeped up unbidden inside her, it felt every bit physical. She was cold, but then again maybe that was because she had nothing else on to warm her.

While she assessed her surroundings the air had changed. She saw the crow land on some discarded debris under the bridge watching her with beady interested eyes. She threw the bottle at it and it shattered the crow flew away. And she waited with her eyes closed, the footsteps echoed closer and closer. Until she felt a wisp of viciousness touch her…she dropped the duffle bag. It made a final ugly thud on the ground. Which sounded very much like death.

"Sooo…this is the great fortress of solitude you come to for all the answers ? How lame….I expected something more hmm….clean" He still spoke with the same indifference and superiority she felt grate on her nerves like a chalk on the board but not quite…it had a crude but smooth quality to it, she gave a small gasp and turned before he could actually touch her.

He saw before she could see him, the omnipresent smile was in place before she could think of what to say. His eyes twinkled, the blue in them almost fluorescent in all the darkness "I like your hair…you let it grow" She touched it subconsciously, it was down over her shoulders now. The sounds of bullets overhead grew less frequent and less loud. Damon took a step closer and she stepped backward. "How long have you been here?"

He clearly did not expect her to ask that because he frowned when answering her "Long enough to see my handy work here"

She knew that, she had felt his presence before Chip and her had met the day the milkshake jug exploded. She should have left this city then and there. She chose not to respond to that, instead she started walking away, he appeared in front of her. Yes that she had expected as well. He was trying to read her motives, her eyes.

She liked the idea that to him she was no longer the easy read Caroline she used to be before, she smiled, slowly "I thought you had better things to do then chase a harmless, airhead cheerleader this far, what? couldn't find someone else to play mind control on?…Did they chase you out"

He bristled at that, Caroline moved again, quickly this time before he could grab her "Just here to tie loose ends…" he looked around assessing her funeral plot "Your friends are …looking for you" She felt her heart quicken at the mention of her friends, they were still her friends? He rolled his eyes and walked around casually, he said the word 'friends' with disdain.

Lie. She could hear it in his voice.

"Didn't know little old humans scared you Damon?" they shared a mutual smile, Caroline held on to a column for support, her legs trembled but she hoped her face didn't show it. "Didn't know you had it in you to be a killer Caroline…let me tell you were …exceptional" He put emphasis on the word 'exceptional' and started walking to her again "Of course I accept complete credit for your 'ahem'…transformation"

Since she was going to die anyway, she didn't feel making him angry or asking a million airhead question would really make a difference. She spat an obscenity at him defiantly which only made him happier.

"Oh come on is that anyway to say you missed me? At least give us a hug before the whole 'woe is me' waterworks" He held out his arms as if he expected her to walk into them. No chance. "You didn't say why you're here?…did my murderous aura attract you because I never did when I was just a cheerleader…"

"it did it for Chip though" he quipped. He watched her move from one column to the other trying to put distance between them but not quite, this time she wanted to keep circling him…he didn't move with her this time, just his eyes. They were sharp she didn't think she would make it out alive just by confusing him. He brightened at the mention of Chip "Oh yeah, the poor bastard…he was such a …groupie" his nose wrinkled in disgust at the memory and she blanched.

"You sent him?" The question felt like cotton in her mouth, she felt like an idiot for asking it, why was she even surprised or the tiny bit hurt hearing this or knowing it she didn't know.

"Nahhh…I didn't send him to you" Why she was relieved to hear that she wasn't sure either. "But I did point him towards you"

Caroline closed her eyes, it wasn't the glee in voice that made her close up momentarily just the idea of the game he was playing to really be a game up to when he waited for her to stab Chip to appear in the window, applauding her like she had completed a final hurdle. And she was going to win a prize. Or he'd won something.

She was sure it was the latter. Her quiet must have given him the wrong idea "Oh come on Caroline, you have to admit it was hilarious…the guy thought you were Buffy or something…he was already pretty dim with the reality side of things anyway, didn't take much to make him think of you like some kind of superhero"

Realization dawned on her like a ton of bricks, She swallowed "You hypnotized him?…He wasn't a vampire?" Damon cracked his knuckles, "Only a little bit…the rest was all you baby…Besides who would turn him, he's like the Andrew of that Buffy show, haven't you ever heard of role play" He laughed and she realized just how horrible his laugh was. Why had she never noticed before? Where the hell had she been? Where?

Poor dumb Chip. While she contemplated his fate and hers Damon rattled on with his verbal attack, the old strategy of trying to knock the legs from under her by insulting her character, how Chip had worshipped her like the goddess slayer. At one point he stopped and told her she and Chip were a match made in heaven. "Clueless and dumb meets selfish and whacky…it would have made a great show"

She seethed where she stood, the anger was leaving very little fear left to be desired. She had desired it when she had met Damon, when he had chased her through the woods into death, even while she was coming here…There was no fear anymore. When Caroline still didn't speak he started talking again. "Hmmm you were asking something …why am I here?...you know Caroline lets face it I'm a 100+ un dead guy trying to get by" he paused to check is he had her attention, this seemed important, "…the human hijink's like partying and sleeping around don't really do it for me anymore...even the chasing and drinking from a victim just feels so contrived…let me tell you its become …Boring!"

He started coming closer again and this time she didn't move, She felt charged with something, something that was not fear…maybe the poison was working ? "Ever considered killing yourself?" The ruse was not to elicit a laugh but it did from him, Caroline inched closer to the duffel bag he was circling.

"You Caroline Forbes, being the most simpleton of all cheerleaders has given me something I've not had for decades now, last time I did this was in the 70's" interesting she thought, what could a 100+ undead psycho gain from all this? "What's that? Disease I hope?" she quipped, his lips twitched but he did not smile only raised an eyebrow to that and continued with a snarl "The perfect blood"

It was simple and small his reasoning but she stood staring at him feeling as blank as his vapid expression right now as he waited for her to get it, she didn't. Guess he rightly concluded her lack of skills to see the bigger picture, but she need not worry this why he was here. For full disclosure and tie up lose ends, one such being her.

He stopped walking when he hit her duffle bag and looked at it questioningly, he looked at her "So explain something to me, how come you brought this, I mean you dumped your stuff in the river, you weren't running away were you, because I don't exactly smell fear on you, question is what have you got in this Caroline" How observant of him.

Her answer was silence, she looked at him blankly. Damon unzipped the bag took one look and looked like he wanted to whoop with laughter, pulled out the huge stake she had painstakingly made in the 5 months she had spent her, it was wooden, heavy and pointy enough to take a whole heart out. "You came to kill me! That was your big plan to bring me here and stake me with silence?, to be honest I expected something crazier from you…or lets face it , I didn't"

He threw the stake behind him, it landed with a solid 'thud', she knew she could find it if she got a chance, she just needed to get to the side he was standing. But before she could look back at him he was on her and he slammed her against the column. It hurt like hell, her vision swam for a moment, her ears were ringing but she was pretty sure it was him talking to her "Lame Caroline!, Very lame …sorry wont work, I could snap you're neck in the time it takes for your eyes to rove over the stupid stake"

Caroline steadied herself, she had the courage she needed to keep it up for a while longer, before he could kill her…"Then why don't you…quit stalling Damon, I'm a bit tired of your 'look I'm so evil' impersonations"

On that note he unceremoniously dropped her, she fell on her butt…hard, and she was pretty sure there would be a bruise later on. Of course if there was a later on.

"I was answering your question whose answer you didn't bother to figure out in the last 5 months of your isolation period…not that I expected you to understand of course, you aren't really big on deep thoughts"

She studied him rubbing her head, although her back was killing her from being slammed so hard against the stone column, her hands couldn't reach without making it more painful, she decided it had to be the head "you said something about the 'perfect blood'"

"Oh yes, thank you…I was telling you that life in Mystic Falls made me realize just how boring everything's become but I guess that happens when you live for more than a century see everything, do everything"

She sat up straight now deciding to remain perfectly still and observe his movement, he leaned on his arm watching her form like a bruised rat trying to wriggle away from a cat with very pointy nails. "you got bored, so I was a good distraction and you missed me?"

"Cute but no…no, you haven't listened to a word I've said…" he sounded so forlorn then and started walking away from her, she felt confused was she meant to follow, sit there defiantly refusing to budge ? Throw something at him? Could have done with throwing something at him, that might reduce her life span by a few minutes…not worth it.

"When I chased that red head back in the 70's, it wasn't about the kill…well ok, it was but not completely…I got her to trust me first, I slept with her…bit her…erased her memories, bit her again drove her a bit loony because the long term side effects of this erasing memories they can make a human pretty unstable"

Caroline grew colder with his words, even though she tried not to hear him and focused on inching towards the stake Damon had gotten rid off, darkness confused her but she wasn't afraid of the dark it was what he would stay next that would give her goose bumps because just when she thinks he can't make it any worse she gets chilled to the bone. "I knew what I was doing, it was funny at first but then she killed someone or almost did, and she just took the high road, left her life behind…started anew, tried to forget about me yaddi yaddi yadda. But, I followed her everywhere she went, I made her kill a couple of work colleagues and then she just …retreated into herself , stopped working , going out, everything, that girl she… " he looked at her this time with purpose "...snapped"

There was a strange mixture of pity and enlightenment in his eyes, she feared…no, that he had snapped. What he was saying was crazy and yet it made a twisted kind of sense, it was hard to imagine herself as him but she could see his point about nothing the kill missing the thrill after a century or so of practicing and perfecting it. It then it all ended up being …contrived and routine like drawing blood from a patient in a hospital by glamouring them. Damon sighed "It was perfect…"

"Isolation" she completed for him. He looked like he appreciated her input this time, atleast she was listening, but still shook his head ruefully not unkindly "No Caroline it was perfect despair…the blood of a despairing lunatic can be only the best blood ever"

The perfect blood. Filled with unending despair. That was the word she had been looking through all those paperbacks for, that's what Chip had been trying to capture in all his drawing of her, that was the word she had been trying to remember while sitting under this very bridge, she tried to look surprised and shocked but it wouldn't come. Her expressions seemed to have shut down like the rest of her body, the floor was cold, her limbs were practically frozen to the ground. The echo of his words had a ring of finality to it.

Story time was over. He was trying to recreate a sport that had given him some kind of twisted pleasure. This was the end.

"I'll be sure to never mention anything to your friends…oh and your mother…what a blubbering mess, whoever made her the sheriff huh" He was coming to her now and she was closer to the stake but not quite the last bit of his effort to get a rise out of her worked, she fixed him with her best glare as he crouched in front of in touching distance. He didn't. "This is ultimately what it all boils down to Caroline your meaningless insignificant life who no one was really interested in looking for…they all moved on"

She nodded, he was right "don't you find it ironic that im the only one to looked for you, found you and now will lead you to your equally meaningless demise?"

Caroline had found Damon the handsome devil every girl coveted in her dreams of teenage rebellion, she had treated the whole deal like a movie although even in the beginning she sensed there were no Disney endings for her. Now she felt an apathy so intense for him, hate was a word that wasn't enough to cover it. Her life did not flash in front of her eyes, she did not wonder if the last 6 months would have been different if she hadn't met him. She accepted this fate completely…there weren't many things left she wanted to say to him anymore except "Then what the hell are you waiting for?...finish it!"

He vamped out, the red in his eyes glowed more intense than ever and then the last thing she felt when he smashed into her being was the pain.

Her mouth remained open in a soundless scream for a long time…until he threw her away, she landed on the hard ground in the darkness, something felt broken, she was pretty sure it wasn't her mind...and then he started to choke.

-…-

Caroline clutched her arm to her herself as Damon continued to convulse, his fangs had retracted, and he was on all fours hacking like he'd bitten into something poisonous.

"You bitch…you took verbane?…" he gasped out in her general direction.

Verbane? Poison?. She had drunk the poison in Elena's purse, he was down like a house of cards. Caroline looked in the direction of light or what she thought was a light, maybe it was the blood loss and saw that he had thrown her closer to the stake then he realized. Even as her limbs and arm screamed in pain she turned over and swiped at the stake.

"You don't get to kill me…not a stupid cheerleader"

She used it as an anchor to get up, the vampire watched her incapacitated as she walked towards him, his eyes grew large. "You wouldn't dare Caroline..." he warned, even still struggling on his back. She twirled the large wooden stake with her good arm watching him slither uneasily; she could felt a smile and a campy line coming on.

"Why the hell wouldn't I Damon? I'm not a stupid cheerleader….I'm the slayer right now" with that she stabbed him in the heart with every ounce of strength remaining in her. His flesh gave with a slight zing and she felt the stake go through out the back,

She had never seen him surprised or shocked and right now he looked both. It was picture perfect moment. Chip should have been here to snap it. She committed it to her memory anyway

Caroline looked him in the eyes as he faded away, The light in them dimmed, the skin on him turned the color of old mushrooms as she said a soft 'goodbye' and heard him moan her name once, he was as dead as the rest of the world around her.

'Goodbye Damon'

And she was really alone now… to collapse gracelessly.

….-…..

When Caroline came to she sat there for a long time hearing the sound of the cars moving over the bridge, like bullets, it was getting louder as dawn approached, the slight sunrise cast a glow on everything around her, it even touched the darkness under the bridge, she had let go of the stake and settled back against the column, her back felt better, her arm still hurt. She wasn't sure about how much blood Damon had managed to drain from her before he had started to choke on it. He had called it the perfect blood.

Ironic that the pursuit of the perfect blood had been the death of him.

Caroline waited for hours, she still did no sink into unending and eternally quieting sleep. She was still alive. As she rose out from under the shadows and started walking away, she felt an apology and a 'thank you' were in order. She picked up the pay phone and pushed in some lose change that was miraculously still there.

A muffled sleepy voice said 'hello' into the receiver and for a moment Caroline blanched, she had just automatically dialed 'her' number, she was amazed that she still remembered Elena Gilbert's number. Maybe it hadn't been that long after all. When Caroline managed a soft hello, Elena recognized her immediately that brought tears to her eyes, she wanted to say 'thank you for saving my life and sorry that I always secretly hated you for being a moralizing existence on my life, but nothing came.

Elena was pretty awake now.

"Caroline thankgod! Where have you been?, we've been looking for you forever!…we tried so hard to get it out of Damon, but he didn't know where you are"

Even thought there was nothing more soothing to hear her old friend's voice she interrupted Elena without meaning to "I killed him"

"Killed who honey? Where are you tell me, we'll come and get you"

Now she felt a bit irritated, she shifted the phone to the other shoulder and held her arm securely "I killed Damon, Elena"

There was a significant pause on the other side and Elena spoke with some trepidation, or what she atleast felt trepidation sounded like on the phone. "Sweety…Damon's alive…he's still here, we just talked to him today"

The phone felt a foreign object in her hand and own voice sounded like child gibberish as she rattled of how Damon had followed her and made her kill ..people, and that his body lay dead under a weakening grafitied bridge.

"Caroline listen to me, He made you think those things or dream them or something, because Damon is alive and he's her"

Caroline listened to Elena but nothing she was saying made any sense. She wanted to tell Elena to shut up and let her think, she wanted to tell her Elena was wrong because she was the one with the broken arm and bloody bite marks to prove it.

Her hand went subconsciously to the bit on her neck, she touched it gently afraid to feel the pain, the skin curiously felt …unbroken. She took her hand away and looked at it, there was no blood. It was very clean. She touched her neck again there was no pain, nothing, her arm still hurt but not so much anymore.

"Hello? Caroline ? it's Stefan, Elena's telling me you think you killed Damon, He's still here and we have him under control…I think it's a side effect of what he did to you when he escaped from the basement…Are you there?..."

She refused to believe it, or not believe it, Damon had been here, he had been very real, as real as Chip and that man in the alley she had killed. Caroline groped her pockets as if the proof of them being wrong would magically appear in them, she hands touched something square and hard…she pulled it out. It was a pack of cigarettes.

She remembered Frank telling her smoking is bad for her, the smell of cigarettes and cinnamon being around her all the time, the times when the waitresses or Frank looked at her strangely when she fought with Chip to leave her alone. Chip's jacket that had remained hanging on her coat rack, it was hers?, these were her cigarettes? Was chip real? how much had been a crazed figment of her troubled mind?

She had been the one smoking for the last 5 months.

Stefan's voice rang through her panic "Caroline! Whatever you think you're seeing or saw might not be real…Damon messed with your mind, he might have implanted suggestions in there...Caroline? are you listening? Tell us where you are? You need help, Hello?..."

She dropped the phone and looked dark silhouette of the bridge in the morning sunlight. Something told her there would be no body there anymore.

Something squawked loudly and ominously. She lifted a hand to her eyes to shied them from the sun. A shadow fell over her. The damn crow. It had landed on her shoulder and it seemed awfully friendly for some reason. Caroline stroked it's beak experimentally, the bird responded by ruffling its feathers and settling on her shoulder more permanently.

"Hey little fella…you were looking after me weren't you?" the crow squawked in agreement.

Caroline Smiled. She had a new friend. She said 'thankyou' to Stefan Salvatore and replaced the receiver of the pay phone.

-…-

The End

A.N: Yes, this fic has come to an end, a twisted end, but u are free to interpret as you like, My original plan was to have the real Damon follow her chase her and have a good showdown with her, but then I realized with emily's necklace in his possession it would all look very out of character for Damon to still run after Caroline, other storylines also looked a bit improbable, this ending appealed the best to me.

With Caroline's traumatized state it all seemed like a better idea, so if anyone was disappointed I am deeply regretful.

thankyou all for your support and reviews to continue and finish this story, it helped allot.

Till the next fic, let me know wht u all thought of the ending….

R


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